


Home in Your Hands

by DarthSuki



Series: To Love a Titan [2]
Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Breeding Kink, Domestic Fluff, F/M, Feral Behavior, Ficlet Collection, Fluff, Fluff and Smut, Human/Titan Relationships, Hurt/Comfort, M/M, Macro/Micro, Oral Sex, Possessive Behavior, Pregnancy Kink, Protectiveness, Self-Indulgent, Size Difference, Smut, Survival, Titan Eren Yeager, Titan Shifters
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-01-18
Updated: 2021-03-15
Packaged: 2021-03-16 11:41:53
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 14
Words: 33,783
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28830591
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DarthSuki/pseuds/DarthSuki
Summary: This is set within a canon-divergent AU series where the reader is a survivor of Quinta - one of the districts on Wall Maria that was left abandoned after its fall - and is saved by Eren, who has been in his titan form for so many years that he's almost forgotten how to be human.Through their companionship the reader is offered a freedom beyond the walls of Quinta and Eren discovers that he finally has a meaning to his existence: to protect them.Each chapter stands on its own about the adventures, trials and challenges for this duo, and do not inherently need to be read in a particular order.
Relationships: Attack Titan (Shingeki no Kyojin)/Reader, Eren Yeager/Reader
Series: To Love a Titan [2]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/2123775
Comments: 96
Kudos: 601
Collections: EREN JAEGER|AOT





	1. Rainy Days

**Author's Note:**

> If you would like to read the reader's origin story for this AU, I've posted it as a [separate story here!](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28954998) You can also find Eren's origin story for the AU, posted [here!](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28972956)

The rain hasn't let up for hours. It's annoying, but there's very little that you can do to shield yourself from the cold drops falling from the saturated canvas above your head. Each one feels spiteful in your attempt to challenge mother nature. Still, at least you're vaguely protected by the downpour, and even the thick canopy of trees farther above your head helps somewhat to absorb much of the rain.

It's not a perfect existence, making a life in the forest so far from where your journey of isolation began, but there are plenty of blessings to make up for the challenges.

Being alive is certainly one. Breathing is another. Being able to wake up each morning with the knowledge that you didn't die to the clutches of starvation, dehydration or... well, of course, the hungry maw of a titan is certainly up there on the list.

You contemplate long enough to distract yourself from the pitter-patter of cold raindrops sinking through your makeshift cover and falling on your head, then tickling down your scalp and neck. Distract yourself from how cold you feel, a chill having worked it's way to the bone. Hunger is the only thing you can't quite ignore, gnawing on your abdomen and thoughts alike with equal discomfort, but all you allow of yourself is to flick your gaze towards the half-covered rucksack of old ODM gear that had saved your life as many times as it endangered it.

It is barely functional on the best days, after so many months of neglect. The hooks had a hard enough time digging into the thick bark of the giant trees - you could only imagine how horribly they'd fail now that they were slick with rain. You might be able to lower yourself down onto the forest floor, but what then? You counted at least five small titans roaming about in the last several hours, and you'd not last even a minute against them without the advantage of height and speed. At least in your makeshift treehouse, you always stand out of reach from all but the largest of them.

These thoughts continue to dwell for a few moments, but are not allowed anymore time to fester into anguish - a sound of footsteps, deep and heavy, appear at the edge of your senses.

A titan.

For any other poor soul, the sound of such a massive presence would be a signal of approaching doom. The sound is of an unwavering force of nature, like a howling storm - only this force of nature has a taste for blood and a penchant to rip roofs off with hungry hands rather than whipping winds.

But you are not such a poor soul, and neither this approaching force of nature seeking for your demise. It's difficult to make out much beyond the curtain of rain and dark thicket of the trees, but you eventually spot a familiar form trudging through the muddy loam of the forest floor. Massive enough to be eye-level with your shelter, the creature would put almost anyone into a state of terror at the sight.

A titan.

Behind a shaggy mop of dark hair there are gentle green eyes which soften upon seeing you, mostly unmoved from where you'd been that morning. You _had_ promised him, after all.

"About time you get back," the words fall easy and warm from your lips, as if you aren't talking to a massive beast who can easily snapped you between two fingers. With a sigh, you stand and step towards the edge of the platform, arms open as if for a hug. "I was starting to get worried about you, big guy."

The titan could have eaten you then and there in one quick, efficient motion. Pounce forward, mouth open, life over. That's what most of them would do, and that's what anyone would expect to happen.

But this one - the one who calls himself Eren - simply leans his face forward enough to nuzzle against the front of your body like an oversized puppy.

And he purrs. You never thought such a sound was even possible for a titan to make, but he rumbles all the same against your comparatively tiny form.

It's a familiar greeting from him. He feels pleasantly warm to the touch, and you are almost disappointed when his face eventually pulls away to reveal a wide maw of intimidating, lipless jaws. Despite not being able to make a worthwhile expression in the same way that you can it's not too hard to read the look that all but glimmers in his gaze.

"Did you find something out there?" You find yourself asking, even though you know he can't do much to reply to you - you'd been traveling with him for weeks before even learning the titan had a name, and that was only because he's managed to messily scrape it into the dirt in a massive series of trenches that spelled 'Eren'.

He seems to understand you well enough otherwise, finding the meaning in your words but being unable to replicate those words himself. And that's okay, as the two of you have found a semblance of understanding despite the _many_ differences between you.

Eren rumbles, then slowly raises a closed fist which he then unfurls to reveal a raincoat a half-smashed container reading in scratched letters 'MILITARY RATIONS'.

"Holy shit," you don't even think before you're clamoring onto the beast's open palm, rain falling openly onto you. You barely even register how cold it feels against your skin. "Where did you find this stuff so far from the wall?"

You don't expect a fluent answer. The question is merely rhetorical, to fill the air with sound and words which always seems to make Eren happier. You never knew titans could get lonely. But then again, you never met a titan quite like Eren at all before he rescued you from near-death several months ago. A lonely titan playing guardian to a forgotten garrison soldier.

The two of you made for an odd duo, if not functional despite that.

By the time you're back on the platform proper, the raincoat is already wrapped around your shoulders. It's wrinkled and old from years of disuse and neglect, but it functions enough for your needs; the rations too, with cans completely unopened within the larger package, and would be enough to last you for a while.

"Did you find a supply cache?"

Eren shakes his head, though his ears twitch in what you've learned is amusement.

"Abandoned town? I suppose there's a couple nearby..."

The titan looks at you, contemplating the words, and then slowly nods his head - close enough of an answer. The details don't really matter to you anyway. Food in your belly, and something to keep you dry (or at least less wet). Yet another gift, another boon, another day to live that might never have happened if it wasn't for Eren.

One fateful meeting had changed everything. Just one decision had left you out in the open and face to face with what you thought was death. How ironic is it that the force to save you is the very same one which destroyed you, or rather, your home.

Eren is a titan.

That much is obvious, but he treats you like you're fragile instead of food. Like a doll or even a pet, and it's equally obvious he understands what your needs are as a human. But how? How would a titan understand anything that a human needs? Their bodies burn to the touch, they need no food, they seek no shelter. And yet one of them, for the last year, has done everything in his power to keep you sheltered, fed, and warm. Eren is an enigma, but a familiar one all the same at this point, and you're simply happy to be alive despite everything that life has thrown at you with the force equivalent to a storm.

Suddenly, there's something pressed against your back. It takes a second to pull yourself from your thoughts and realize the pressure as Eren's index finger against your back, gently encouraging you to step onto his open hand at the edge of the platform.

After a few wobbly steps that leave you almost falling into the beast's palm (and a concerned rumble from above) you find yourself kneeling beneath Eren's gaze. His hand is characteristically warm beneath your knees, a soothing contrast to the iciness of the air.

"Something you wanna tell me, big guy?"

Eren purrs and strokes a broad finger up and down the center of your back. He moves after a moment, slowly lowering his body until he's sitting with his back against the same tree upon where your shelter is built. The gargantuan tree in comparison almost made him seem normal-sized and you feel absolutely tiny. But maybe that's a good thing.

From there, he cups one hand over the other, shielding you from the rain as he brings you up and closer to his face. 

It doesn't take very long for you to realize what he's doing. After spending several hours in the cold rain you're not going to complain either, even if you were still getting used to being held and manhandled like a child's beloved doll.

He nuzzles you, gently, with the bridge of his nose bumping against the front of your body. Normally in this situation his body heat would feel almost uncomfortable, but it now feels so perfect, warm and safe against your sopping clothes and icy skin.

"Thank you," you whisper, a little unsure if the titan can hear such a soft noise.

Evidently he can well enough, as he rumbles once more in answer before the same noise dies down into a low, lingering purr which eventually lulls you to sleep. You feel safe and warm in his hands.

In some sense, they even feel like home.


	2. Old Nightmares

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Recently saved from your abandoned district of Quinta after the fall of Wall Maria, you and a strange titan named Eren try to find a place to call home for the both of you. Unfortunately when he leaves you alone to search the local land of a farmhouse, you realize that you never really left Quinta entirely behind--and some of that trauma is still fresh and crimson.

He was only gone for a minute.

Just a minute.

Perhaps not even long enough for you to take in the sight of the entire valley from atop the decrepit roof he left you to wait upon. After all, it’s not as if you felt wholly unsafe from where you stood—two stories up, solid, and you couldn’t even recall seeing another titan since the previous morning. For all intents and purposes, you were as safe where you stood on someone’s forgotten house as you had been in the palm of your impromptu-guardian’s hand.

There didn’t seem to be a single reason for you to be worried when he left you there, promising with an nonverbal purr that he would return; over the last few months, you’d learned how to interpret the strange titan’s form of communication. Though rudimentary, he seemed intelligent enough to understand the tactical advantage of scouting ahead, especially without you atop his shoulder to attract the attention of any other titans he might have otherwise come across in the local area.

And that was how he’d left you this time, safe enough from harm’s way with enough height from the ground that you couldn’t be easily grabbed or ambushed by anything less than a titan of equal or greater height—and those were somewhat rare in the western provinces. Most of them had long-since traveled farther inward, towards Wall Rose—a boon for you if nothing else.

Perhaps your boots were more worn than you realized. Perhaps the shingles lining the rooftop had deteriorated. Perhaps the recent rain had left the surface slick, or perhaps—

It didn’t matter.

By the time your mind could catch up with the rush of motion, your feet had already slipped out from beneath you. And as they slipped, so did everything else follow. You tumbled down, the shingles slipping out and falling apart from the decrepit roof like a line of dominos, carrying you with them as they tumble off the side of the roof and down to the unforgiving earth below.

Only you don’t fall to solid earth. Instead, after feeling a brief instance of open air and weightless feeling of freefall through your adrenaline-filled body, a soft warmth is what meets you instead. While it dampens the fall enough that you’re not immediately aware of shattered bones, the impact yet echoes painfully through your entire form. Tumbling head-over-heel, you eventually roll to a stop.

Awareness slowly returns, muffled by the shock. Then your eyes open, and the pain starts to fade into existence enough to feel it proper.

“Fuck,” you mutter, blinking dirt out of your eyes as you try to take a quick stock of your situation and injuries. Bruises and scrapes, but you get to your feet well enough—so no broken legs.

It wasn’t the first time you’d fallen from such a height, but all the previous times had been planned for and in _extremely_ dire circumstances. This time, it’s due to your own stupidity and short-sightedness, forgetting the simplest facts of survival as simply making sure to watch where you stepped.

Could never be sure what buildings would hold up when they’d been neglected for so many years. You are lucky that the fall had been broken, or else you’d—

Wait.

What broke your fall?

A surge of horror suddenly fills your mind and body as the attention shifts from idle thoughts to the cold, sharp moment in front of you. And when you lift your eyes up towards the building you’d just fallen from, the answer to your question stares straight back at you with wide, hollow eyes, and a half-opened jaw of bloodstained teeth.

No.

The titan had been small enough, idle enough to be missed within the overgrown bushes working up the side of the farmhouse, but big enough that its body had broken your fall. And now, awoken from its trance, the beast gazed upon you with a vacant look of hunger, the same that had haunted your nightmares ever since you’d been freed from Quinta’s walls.

All of your cadet training felt so distant. Useless. Even then, all you had was a half-broken ODM set with almost no gas and your blades long-since broken and rusted away.

The beast tilts its head at you, as if to confirm that you were standing there, bruised and battered but still very much alive—a meal all but served up. It takes a step, feet dragging against the dirt that only served to hammer the feeling of terror even farther into your chest.

_No._

It takes another step. Then another.

And then you snap out of it, pulling your thoughts from old nightmares and back into keeping your present self as alive as physically possible. Of course, the first instinct is to reach for the trigger handles at your hips—while you didn’t have very much gas to use, it was certainly enough to make a quick getaway. That’s why you had kept them, after all, despite the fact that you had no way nor reason anymore to actively try to take out a titan.

Survival over glory, after all.

But it isn’t until you aim the hook and squeeze your finger over the trigger that your heartbeat finally goes silent.

_Click._

You squeeze it again, and again, and again. Each time there is an audible click from the equipment, but nothing more. No hook shooting out, no sudden pull on your body to move you away from certain death. No sudden feeling of relief.

_**NO.** _

“N-” you can barely get a word from between your lips at first, shaking as they are, fluttering as quick as your heartbeat. “No! No no no don’t jam on me now!”

It didn’t make sense. It didn’t seem _fair_. One moment you had been perfectly safe, content even, and thinking about how your luck had turned around for the better at last—after so many months of fending for yourself in that abandoned, isolated hellhole—and suddenly you’re just another weak little human again watching your death shuffle closer and closer to you.

You need to run. You _have_ to run. But even then, your legs are frozen, your mind ablaze with multiple options and even more horrible endings to those options. Though the titan seemed barely able to walk, you’d seen how easily they could pounce the very moment their prey decided to flee. Like a wolf, springing forth with a speed that seemed wholly impossible for their size and tearing their hands into the unfortunate soul that happened to come within their sightline.

You can’t even tear your eyes away as it gets closer, mind running faster than you can try to stop it.

How many people has it already eaten?

Had it eaten the original inhabitants of this house?

Why aren’t you trying to run?

Why won’t your legs move?

_Why?-_

In that moment, all you can do is scream. The deafening sound fills your ears and aches in your throat, until your lungs burn and your entire body is shaking so bad that you can hardly stand—and even then, you can’t move. Can’t run. It feels almost like it did last time, like before—in Quinta—only you have less of an excuse to cower when you’re not otherwise drowning in ice-cold water. This time, fear is the only thing paralyzing you.

But it’s enough.

As the titan at last is close enough to reach out, you feel the tips of it’s fingers start to encircle your shoulders—and all you can do is shut your eyes in a childish attempt to hide it, as if the tears hadn’t already left the world a blurry wet mess of colors. The heartbeat in your chest has gotten so loud, pounding rhythmically in your ears, your body, your feet—

And that’s when you open your eyes, realizing that the sound isn’t your heartbeat.

Before you even have the chance to open your eyes fully, Eren has already all but kicked the other titan away from you. Having barely been lifted a foot or so off the ground, the fall back to it does little more than painfully put you on your ass. But even the pain doesn’t distract you from the sight.

The sight of Eren completely ripping apart the other beast, limb from limb, until thick steam wells up from the ground where all the blood and viscera has spilled at his feet. This is different from how you’d normally see him take out other titans—he’s normally efficient and quick, either gouging out the nape of their neck or sinking his teeth into the soft flesh with relative ease. You’d never seen a titan kill another with such human-like intelligence to their weak spots, let alone simply seeing one titan killing another. But Eren is a strange case. A curious case.

And for once, he’s killing like he _hates_ the other one. As if he’d utterly lost control of himself and his strength, ripping into flesh, muscle and sinew as if the other titan would regenerate from even the smallest scrap.

Like a ravenous, blood-thirsty titan that he was.

A _monster_.

It takes a few seconds for you to realize Eren kneeling in front of you. You can see the crimson staining various spots on his body, slowly vaporizing into the air like the rest of the corpse behind him. In pieces.

You’re still shaking a little bit when you lift your eyes up towards his face. He’s watching you warily, though not staring _at_ you—no, instead he’s looking across you, from one limb to the other, head to toe.

Checking for injuries.

You’d feel equally touched and awed by such a complex act of intelligence and compassion if the sense of terror and adrenaline wasn’t still filling your veins with ice-cold reality. For all that you had done, all the days you’d survived, you still froze when looking into the empty, hallow eyes of certain death. Nothing’s changed since Quinta; the screams of your countrymen haunt the back of your mind with an equal horror as the faces of all the titans who had laid seige to the district all those months after Wall Maria.

And, if it’s only for a moment, Eren’s face feels like one of them.

He reaches a hand out towards you—probably to pull you back onto his shoulder or simply to be safe within sight—but all your mind can see is a monster reaching out to you again, with hallow eyes and a bloodthirsty yearning that could never be sated by all the thousands upon thousands of lives lost between those gleaming teeth.

Irony is as fickle as it is cruel, because _that_ is the one moment that you are able to move. To step back, arms pulling up against your chest, make yourself small and limbs harder to grab. Just as they told you in training so long ago.

Eren’s hand stills. It’s hard to read the emotion in his eyes, but it’s already hard to see much of anything with how the tears fall thick and burning down your cheeks. All the old ghosts, old memories, old nightmares—they come up at all the worst times, seeming to prove how weak and fragile you feel.

You can’t even run from a titan. Can’t even move. Can’t even think.

Confusion and fear leave you trembling, and you finally raise your hands up to wipe away all the tears that don’t stop flowing.

“I’m sorry,” you sob, as much to yourself as it is to Eren. “I’m sorry I’m so useless.”

He isn’t a monster. He isn’t a beast. Despite all the images flashing in the back of your mind, the horrifying recollections of nightmarish things you never want to remember again, the one titan before you is also the only reason that you’re alive. He saved you, continues to save you—and you wish for nothing more than all those memories to be little more than a forgotten bad dream.

Eren can’t say anything in reply, but the obligation in the bottom of your chest to offer him some sort of explanation is too strong for you to ignore.

“I can’t even stand up against a single titan without you having to come to my rescue. I’m just a useless little human. I—…I know you probably can’t even understand me right now, but I just-”

A sudden pressure pushes away your hands still rubbing raw the tears from your cheeks, and that pressure lingers as a touch. The titan’s fingertip feels warm against the side of your face, soothing in such a stark contrast to but a few minutes ago. It anchors you to the moment, enough to get your thoughts and emotions joined enough to think clearly again. To calm the rush of your heartbeat, the shaking of your legs, the free flow of tears falling with seemingly no real origin.

With his other hand, Eren reaches out and strokes the tips of his fingers up and down your back soothingly, making no motions to try and hurriedly usher you into his hand as he’d otherwise to get you back onto the safety of his shoulder. He shouldn’t _need_ to spend so many moments uselessly tending to the emotional needs of such a small creature compared to him. He shouldn’t _need_ to do anything.

But he does. Minutes tick by as he continues to touch you, so gingerly, letting your tears keep flowing until they finally stop. Until you feel exhausted, almost leaning into the pad of his thumb while the rumbling of his chest so sweetly echoes into yours.

And only then does he move, gently turning his open palm so that you can almost fall upon it, curling up with your arms hugging around his thumb with an undeniable sense of exhaustion. Eren watches you, and seems to look you over once more for injuries.

“I promise I’m fine otherwise,” you finally say, feeling the ache in your throat from how hard you’d screamed before. “It barely touched me before you got here.”

Eren’s eyes watch you.

You gaze at him in return. Into his eyes and how they seem to glimmer like emeralds—like there’s something so deep behind them, an endless sense of weight that reaches farther than the clouds in the sky.

And his eyes, you realize, they’re very gentle. Very pretty. Maybe even handsome.

Before you can even realize it, there’s a heat blooming in your cheeks, lingering even when the titan reaches his hand up to let you crawl onto his shoulder and lean against the side of his neck, half-hidden within his shaggy mess of brown hair.

From there, the two of you move on from that farmhouse, making further headway into the feral countryside long since abandoned by humanity deeper within the walls. You’re not sure exactly how far you’d come from where you’d started, but you hope—if the map had been correct—that the journey wouldn’t last too much longer before you’d find a safe place to call home again.


	3. Being Human

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Part of being a titan-shifter is not only the ability to be a titan, but also to be human. Eren has forgotten about that part of himself, but you know it will be just fine. His eyes are always handsome, and he is always gentle--no matter what form he takes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The context for this is kept vague since I want to write his shift to human with more background and detail--I like to think this comes after he and the reader re-integrate inside the walls and join the Survey Corps either as soldiers or outright classified scout secrets. Regardless, I like to think Hanji has been helping Eren slowly connect back with his sense of being human and using it as an opportunity for research and understanding.

When he reaches out to touch you, the motion is slow and deliberate. No, even more than merely deliberate. It’s fearful. It’s as if his fingertips can’t connect with the surface of your skin by some unknown force, but they hover so close that you can feel the gentle warmth of his hand radiating against your arm. It’s not an uncomfortable heat, but just....warm.

Normal human warmth. From a normal human hand.

Wishing you could know what to do than to simply stand there in gentle awe, you start to take in all the little details of the man standing before you, just as much a familiar face as he is a stranger. Eren’s face is no longer gaunt, but his jawline and the curve of his nose is sharp as a knife. His eyes look tired, but glimmer like emeralds beneath the mess of dark hair which, as a human, is long enough to reach his shoulder blades. You can see ears poking out, pointed in much the same way as they are normally--

Well. Comparatively speaking. If he’s spent more time as a titan than at a human, what truly _is_ normal for Eren anymore?

Fingertips finally connect onto your arm, faltering in a way that makes you instinctively look down. His hand is shaking. Trembling, even though Eren’s lips are pressed into a tight line and his jaw so firmly set. But his _eyes_. They had always been your way of peering into his thoughts. They’re filled with emotions that you, even in all your time spent with him, can’t read.

But his hand is trembling.

Fearful. But not fearful _because_ of you. He’s fearful _for_ you, having to relive the very first memories of finding you half-drowned in a flooded pond and remember how to hold you without breaking your bones between his massive fingers.

He doesn’t know how to touch you like this.

Your own hands move without warning, skipping past the part where you’d consider the action or how it might unnerve the man even more, he being more like a skittish cat than a beast able to destroy whole houses. Before you know it, you have Eren’s hand between your own and up towards your face. 

“It’s okay,” your words and lips brush gently over the back of Eren’s knuckles. “You’ll never hurt me, no matter what form you take.”

Eren watches you. Though he’s human, the man’s gaze yet holds all the same weight of a predator. The look had never bothered you all that much, but now it makes you feel... afraid?

No. Fear is the last thing coursing through your veins right now. You trust in your heart of hearts that Eren would sooner hurt himself than to see you harmed, especially by his own hand. But it doesn’t change the way that his eyes feel as though they peer into your soul, trembling all but visibly like his hand against your arm.

They’re very handsome, his eyes. They always have been.

You kiss the back of his knuckles again, holding the man’s wrist with such an ironic gentleness that it makes your heartbeat flutter.

“I love you, Eren.”

Eren’s eyes light up at the words, widen in a way that doesn’t signify simple surprise to your admission; you’ve told him such things for a while yet. But the way his eyes shimmer, how his expression softens--it’s been the only way ever since for him to proclaim his affection in return.

But maybe one day, now that such secrets of his have been unveiled, he’ll be able to tell you those words himself.


	4. Panic

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> You decide to try and gather wildflowers in an attempt to repay Eren for his efforts to protect you, and he returns from a short patrol of the forest to find you missing.

Panic is the only thing filling his veins when his eyes roam over the empty platform high above the trees.

_He was only gone for a few hours._

The great forest was chosen specifically because it kept you safe. With trees so high that they dwarfed even the greatest titan and shade from their leaves nearly as dark as the night, it was supposed to be somewhere with the luxury of feeling safe. You were supposed to be without the constant worry of being attacked even if Eren didn’t near-constantly keep you in his line of sight.

_How could something have happened to you?_

He tore through through the nearby trees, desperate to find you, desperate to locate any detail at all that might indicate what had happened in the hours he’d been gone. Footsteps, scent, sound-

_-blood._

The word makes Eren freeze, his heart stopping cold in the mere _suggestion_ that something terrible might have happened to you. That he’d been so careless to leave you alone, scared and helpless if any titan somehow _did_ manage to make their way up the tree. Or what if you’d fallen? Anything seemed possible—Eren panicked over the idea that you could have slipped off the edge by accident, broken a limb from the fall and…

Then his vision goes red.

* * *

Eren made sure to clear out as much of the forest as possible on the first night you both had found it, accurate to where the aged, crumbling map said it would be.

There were plenty of smaller titans lost and tangled in the thick foliage beneath the gargantuan sea of leaves and wood. Though it didn’t take Eren very much effort to dispatch of each and every one, the work had been tedious, and new titans seemed to wander in every once in a while. He could have simply been done with the effort once you’d built a small platform and hut around where several twisting branches converged against a seemingly ancient tree trunk. He could have decided you were safe enough then, but he didn’t. Even when you were largely self-sufficient and safe far above the forest floor, Eren made sure to prowl as far out into the forest as he could at least once a day to ensure not a single other titan would come anywhere near you.

And that’s what he’d done.

Like any other morning, Eren himself wakes just before the sun had crested over the horizon. There is barely enough light filtering past the thick treetop, but it’s enough that he can still see you clearly through the door of the handmade hut nestled into the trees. You look peaceful in sleep, untouched by worry and fear.

Eren wanted to keep that serene look on your face forever.

Most titans grew active under the light of the sun. Eren was himself an exception to this observed rule, so it was ever fortunate that he could use something so simple to his advantage: when the sunlight filtered into the forest, he would easily pick out what was the sudden shifting of weight telltale of a once-dormant titan and destroy them. One, another, purging every inch that he could reach of their ravenous hunger, of the danger they posed simply by being in the vicinity of your new home.

By the time Eren felt satisfied, the sun was far above the distant hills. He looked up to find the sky a brilliant blue color, telltale at least that he’d spent several hours away from you already. It was the longest he’d ever gone at one time. Despite this, the titan had no reason to worry about you—he’d helped you build your hut so far up into the trees that it was eye-level to him, and he was taller than most of the other titan’s he’d ever seen.

Why wouldn’t you be waiting for him?

* * *

When you awoke to the cold, drifting sunrise, Eren isn’t there. He usually likened to fall asleep against the tree your hobbled home was built on, directly below the platform holding it all up, but the spot is empty when you pull yourself to your feet and lean over the edge to look.

It doesn’t take very long to realize where he’d gone. Even if you weren’t already aware of his daily prowling, it’s not hard to see the fresh footsteps in the dirt beneath you; fresh ones, though you’re working largely on assumption that they are from earlier in the morning, but they more or less match Eren’s size. It’s enough evidence that you’re not worried—between the two of you, Eren is the last person who needs to be fussed over, because he isn’t the one who had to worry about being caught alone in the wildlands since other titans ignored him.

Still, he did all of it for your sake. You may have known the titan for a couple months, yes, but that relationship didn’t linger any longer than this: he saved you, and you asked but one simple favor and that was it. A desperate favor from someone on the brink of death and hopelessness. Eren had granted the favor, but he kept going after the fact. He stood with you, protecting you long after he had any need or obligation for your company.

So what drove him? You wish that you had an answer even now, but the titan is nothing if not a pure enigma, but one that you owe your life to dozens of times over for everything he’s done. He’s found you food and supplies, saved you from other titans, offered you companionship when you’d otherwise be completely alone.

Is there anything you can do to repay him, if even a little bit?

There’s a field of flowers nearby, half-hidden in a spot of the forest where a tree hasn’t grown. It’s close enough to see from the edge of the platform, but hidden by enough foliage that there’s no possible way to be caught off-guard, even if there _was_ a titan who somehow managed to get close. Your ODM gear was working since the last incident as well, and with the military cache that Eren had found a few days ago having replenished your precious supply of gas….

You’re almost giddy with excitement by the time you leap from the platform, feeling as weightless as a bird in the moments before feeling a hook latch into thick tree bark and send you flying towards the clearing.

* * *

Rage and fear and _agony_ burned into Eren’s mind. There was next-to-no trace of thought once he’d come to the desperate realization that you were gone. Gone. What was worse, so much worse, is that he couldn’t find any indication of what _happened_. If a titan had grabbed you, there’d be marks in the tree, footprints on the ground, broken branches and scattered undergrowth and blood staining the soil.

But there’s _nothing_ and that makes it so much worse. The emotions fester and boil inside Eren until he’s barely able to hold them in, hands shaking in trying to hold himself up with the aid of the tree. Vision going blurry, tinted red, heartbeat racing and he can’t stop it even if he’d wanted to. If a titan had actually gotten you he would find it and tear it to pieces, rip and render and shred the monster until there wasn’t a single scrap of it left in existence.

He feels a snarl work up from his chest, the bubbling rage breaking from what little restraint seems to remain in him, if any. What if you’re still alive somewhere in the forest? What if you’re injured and afraid, unable to move? Alone?

Alone.

In a fit of helplessness, Eren drops his jaw. A piercing scream bursts from his chest, full of as much anguish as it is anger, so much so that it shakes the trees and scatters what few birds have nested within them. He screams so hard that it even hurts _his_ ears, until his body aches and his mind is numb to the possibility that he’d lost the only friend he had for as long as he can remember being alive.

Alone.

**“Eren!”**

The voice cuts through the air sharply, leaving it still and cold in the wake of the noise. It feels as heavy as a mountain despite barely having a fraction of the strength of the titan’s scream. And it’s familiar. Eren slowly turns his head towards where he had heard it echo from, fearing that all he’d find is the proof of his growing insanity, but instead…

* * *

You stand before him on shaking legs. Despite yourself, the sound of Eren’s return hadn’t reached your ears at all; you’d been so engrossed in picking every freshly-bloomed flower that you could reach from the small outcropping of the forest floor that had enough sunlight to actually let such beautiful things grow. Blooms of brilliant white and soothing blue flowers, growing without a care to the world around them or the cruelty it carried.

They’re collected in a bundle held tight against your chest, though several had fallen free in your hurried rush to find out what such a bloodcurdling sound had come from. It sounded horrifying, agonizing, and was so loud that your ears are still ringing.

You emerged from round several trees, having to take the long way back since your hands were too full to use the gear properly. A bundle of flowers. A gift.

“Eren!” you scream. “I’m okay! I’m right here!”

You suddenly feel horrible for ever stepping off the platform in the first place. When Eren turns his eyes upon you, a shiver of fear shoots down your spine. Even though he looks instantly, visibly relieved to see you, there’s a moment where you can plainly see something else hidden behind his gaze—anger.

It burns as bright as a wildfire and threatens to swallow up everything that it touches, agonizing in its intensity just as his scream had echoed through the forest and was only now fading from your aching ears.

At first you think the anger is for you, for worrying Eren in some form by not waiting for him to return to collect your silly flowers. And with that assumption you feel almost stupid for doing it in the first place, and that in turn makes the shaking from your legs work up the rest of your body until every inch of you is trembling before Eren’s approaching form.

“I’m sorry!” you shout suddenly, holding out the bundle of flowers as shame and embarrassment burn up your fingertips and arms, shoulders to neck and finally across your cheeks. “I’m—I just—”

Eren’s kneeling before you, one hand reaching out until his fingertips are close enough to touch you.

“I didn’t know it would take so long, and I didn’t hear you come back—I’m so sorry Eren I didn’t mean to worry-”

He presses a fingertip to the front of your face, just barely touching your lips and silencing the waterfall of words that threatened at the back of your throat. It’s not the first time he’s done that either, hushing you in a way that doesn’t take words to so so.

And only then do you look up at his face again. You halfway expect to see that anger still smoldering in the titan’s eyes, but instead all you find is worry and concern so soft that it could envelop your body like a blanket. He’s worried about you— _was_ worried about you. There’s not a single ounce of anger in his gaze, only relief so deep and indescribable that you’ve never seen it in another person before.

When your breathing has slowed, Eren finally pulls his finger and hand away, letting you collect your thoughts properly enough to speak again.

You try raising up the bundle of wildflowers in your hands again, “I picked these for you.”

Eren tilts his head after a moment.

“As a gift!” you continue. “T-to thank you. For everything you do for me. I m-mean… it’s not a lot…” Your eyes linger on the wrapped bundle, eyebrows furrowed with something of concentration so that you can manage to keep making sense of your thoughts despite Eren looking at you like that. Like you’re the only one in the world to watch, the only interesting thing in the universe.

_Maybe even like he’s in love._

_And maybe you are too._

With a single breath so full and deep in your lungs that it almost hurts, you steel yourself in declaring, “There is so little that I can do to thank you for protecting me,” you’ve shut your eyes tight, though not even that can hide how hot your face burn. “-but I wanted to do _something_ that might make you happy.”

Eren watches. He _watches_.

“I don’t want to ever want to leave you, Eren. _I want you to protect me forever_.”

There’s silence for a few moments. More than the silence of him being unable to talk in return, of course, but the silence of deliberation and thought.

When you open your eyes, it’s to find his face mere meters away from your own. He’s moved practically onto his hands and knees, lowering himself so far down that he’s on _your_ level instead of his own. Watching you with such soft, endlessly enigmatic eyes you’ve but barely learned how to read.

And suddenly, you feel Eren’s broad, massive fingertips against your back. Rubbing up and down your spine in soothing circles, a motion that time and time again the titan had used to try and soothe you through nightmare and dream alike. As if he’s assuring you of something, but you don’t quite know what it is at first.

But then he pulls his hand back and you think that he’s reaching to try and grab you—but instead, with delicate and precise dexterity you’d never expect even him to manage, he pulls several flowers poking out from the rest of the bundle. The stems are somewhat crushed beneath the pressure of even his thumb and forefinger, but Eren is especially careful not to brake the delicate blossoms—he pulls them towards himself in a motion that you can’t quite understand. To eat them? To smell them? You were the one to pick them yes, but even then you knew the titan would have absolutely no use for the tiny, fragile things.

But it shocks you to see him bring the flowers up above his eyes, pressing them in a strange motion against the shaggy hair often hiding some of his face.

When he lowers the hand, you see the blossoms nestled delicately in place, like tiny stars in the sea of the titan’s dark locks.

And then you lower your eyes to Eren’s own, finding that he’s watching you again. Measuring your reaction.

It takes a moment, but a smile starts to tug at the corners of your lips.

“I think you look handsome with some flowers in your hair,” you muse, as if to yourself. “I think the colors suit you really well.”

Just before you are able to take the steps forward to put his cheek within arm’s reach, Eren’s hand moves again towards the bundle of flowers—he takes some between his thumb and forefinger with the same amount of restraint. Before you’re able to follow the motion, you feel the tip of a step touch your temple, slide against the side of your head and over the top of your ear.

Eren looks at you and the flowers in your hair, brilliant white and blue—like the sky and the clouds, endless and free above your heads—and he purrs at the sight. You can hear the noise rumble gently from the titan’s chest, even feel it through the bottom of your feet as it echoes into the ground, but it’s Eren’s eyes that leave you the most breathless.

_They look good on you too._

He strokes the back of a knuckle against your burning cheek, words unspoken, but deafening in the beautiful enigma of his gaze.


	5. Eat You Up [Semi-NSFW]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> A snapshot of a morning for the reader and Eren after re-integrating into the walls, where they live in a quiet home next to Wall Maria under law and orders of the Survey Corps. Eren is getting used to being human for some stretches at a time, but he never stops being like the gentle titan you originally met and fell in love with. Stubborn, affectionate, but most importantly,
> 
> _Hungry for you._

Waking up in a bed is still a new experience for you, all things considered. Pillows instead of a rucksack, blankets instead of old military jackets, a roof of brick and wood instead of leaves and branches above your head.

But you’re certainly not going to complain.

Despite seeing the walls towering above your head and feeling them constantly pressing down on your shoulders, being tucked within their confines isn’t all that bad--even moreso since you weren’t dealing with it by yourself.

The sun has just barely peaked over the horizon when you opened your eyes, high enough that it’s light can reach above the walls and filter down to the humble village below. You don’t worry much about the window being open and curtains drawn wide, because it’s not as if there is anyone else to peer through them to begin with.

One of the most explicit conditions of being allowed to live within the walls of course was that you and your partner would reside practically next to Wall Maria, but far from the districts so as to not draw attention to yourselves. It seemed more than fair, and hardly bothersome; you’d been living in isolation from the rest of the wall residents for nearly a year before the Scout Regiment took the two of you in.

You ponder on the memories for a few moment, mind yet bleary from having just woken up, eyes staring out the window to watch what you’re able of the sunrise.

But the moment doesn’t last long. There’s a motion beside you, another body twisting in the sheets and turning over with an arm falling over your stomach. Lips press over the curve of your shoulder in gentle, silent kisses.

“How long have you been awake?” you murmur, gently tilting your head to give the trailing mouth more room to kiss into the side of your throat.

“Not long,” comes the rough answer from soft lips.

“Well,” you let your eyes linger on the open window for a few moments more. “Were you able to sleep through the night?”

There’s a brief silence as your partner thinks about it.

“More or less,” he says, and presses another kiss at your jaw, just under your ear. A hint of teeth so delicately scrape along your skin and it sends a shiver down your spine.

You turn around suddenly enough that it seems to catch the other off-guard, heat on your cheeks and amusement in your eyes. It settles deep in your heart when you're greeted to the sight of Eren’s tired face. Even though his hair is rough and messy from the pillows, and his eyes outlined by dark shadows of ongoing sleep problems, he looks breathtaking to you.

So much so that when you sigh, there’s words forming on the exhaled breath simply on habit alone, “I love you so much.”

Maybe it’s the sunlight that catches in the man’s eyes, or maybe you’re just seeing things--but you certainly catch the way his lips pull into a smile that’s just a little _too_ wide, but it’s handsome all the same considering you’d already fallen head-over-heels for him when he wasn’t even human to begin with.

“Love you too,” Eren whispers, and leans his face into your throat. Instead of kisses meeting the delicate flesh, you instead feel teeth, pressing just hard enough against your skin to feel it, to understand perfectly well that the man could leave a sea of marks across your skin if you would allow him even half the chance to do so.

But he’s gentle this morning, working his mouth down the center of your chest, nipping at all the little points of your bare skin that drew gasps from between your lips. His hair, long and soft, tickles against wherever his mouth doesn’t touch. 

“Eren-” his name is barely more than a strained inhale. “Are you trying to eat me?”

You can’t help the giggle that moves up your throat, but Eren looks up at you all the same with an arched brow and a stone-cold seriousness in his expression. He doesn’t say anything verbally, but you know him well enough to read the stubborn ‘ _yes’ that he says with his eyes._

He nips at the bottom of your sternum, then kisses down your belly.

“You’re not doing a very good job of it then.” 

Amusement and lust begin to twist against one another in a warm, beautiful symphony of emotions. Now that Eren is able to hold his human form for days at a time, you can’t help but love being able to wake up to him like this. To feel the warmth of his entire body against you, to shiver at the touch of his hands when he wanted you close.

Eren glances up at you once more. “Yes I am,” he argues in curt, short words. 

Once more, he presses his lips to your belly--but it’s then that your mind finally starts to catch up on where the man’s been leading his lips down your body. Only then does amusement start to wane in favor of something far more carnal, a need leaking into your belly that bursts into a flame when he moves farther, farther down towards the center of your hips.

It’s certainly different than what you were used to in these intimate moments with him, at least in the sense that you’d grown so accustomed to feeling fondled and caressed while fitting so perfectly in the palm of his hand. Of his fingers pressing just enough to move your limbs where he wanted them, to spread your legs open and let the tip of his hot tongue trail up the inside of your thigh and... 

Eren looks up, just inches away from where you want his mouth most, and he smiles with half-lidded, mischievous eyes. He is certainly no titan right now, but his tongue feels just as dangerous near such a sensitive place--just as dexterous as ever, and his eyes practically gleam with need.

Need to touch you. To hold you. To _taste_ you.

“ _Eat you up_ ,” the man murmurs lowly, so much that the rumble of his voice is reminiscent to the comforting sound of his purr as a titan. “- _want to_ _taste every inch of you_.”


	6. Among the Flowers [NSFW]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> It comes on the night when Eren decides to show you a place he's found--a flowery hillside, just beyond the safety of the forest where the two of you have set up something of a home. When you stare up at the endless heavens and realize how close you and Eren have gotten, to the point that the words 'I love you' are in almost every interaction you share. 
> 
> It comes on this night where you, for the first time, want to feel exactly what kind of things are hidden in those beautiful eyes of his--and he is more than willing to show you.

The moon is beautiful.

A beacon of light within the night sky; you can’t help but feel some ethereal sense of peace simply by watching it sit amid the stars. It’s no wonder that poets and romantics alike used its heavenly glow as a symbol of beauty and love. Though you feel all the same sense of awe beneath the light of a full moon as you might the sunrise, there is something evermore dreamlike in watching it wade through the dark sea above your head.

The breeze starts to pick up. It brushes against your skin like a gentle caress, though the sound of whispering eventually pulls your attention down from the heavens towards the earth around your sprawled limbs among the flowers. Grass and leaves tickle the sides of your face, but offer such a softness that you might even fall asleep right where you lay, if only to try and capture the sight of endless galaxies and starlight in your dreams.

But instead you peer up, and up, tilting your head as far back as possible to check and see if—

A shadow falls over you suddenly before you’re able to finish the motion. It’s answer enough to your question, especially when there’s no missing the sharp glow of eyes hovering above your face.

“And here I thought you might have fallen asleep yourself,” you murmur, but Eren merely watches you in kind. His shaggy hair falls around his face like a dark curtain.

You sigh and stretch out your limbs for a moment, as if to try and reach the edges of the flower field with your fingertips. Instead, silken blossoms slide over the back of your hands and knuckles, and another breeze of cool air whirls around each flower to create that same delicate whisper from what feels like the earth itself is murmuring to you.

Never once did you think you’d find a place so beautiful in all of your life—from within even the walls of Quinta, you couldn’t believe that such majesty even existed, and it all to be experienced by simply lying down on a wild hillside while watching the night sky dance with stars.

“If only we could stay out here the whole night,” you wonder to yourself, loud enough at least for Eren to hear and huff in dismissal. You look up at him again and offer a halfway apologetic smile. “I know, it’s dangerous even with you watching me. But… it’s really nice out here, you know. Can’t see the moon or stars at all beneath all those trees back in the forest.”

It’s Eren’s own doing that led to you being here in the first place—you assume he found the flowery hillside while prowling around the forest in search for any errant titans within the territory. The notion that he cared enough to bring you to it, to let you enjoy such a simple pleasure as laying among fresh spring flower blossoms, is endearing all on its own.

But you want the moment to last forever. You want nothing more than to grab it between your hands and stuff it inside your heart so that you’d never forget how free it made you feel to look up at the endless ocean of stars. If for nothing more than a single night, you didn’t want to think about anything but this _very_ moment of peace and contentment between the two of you.

After letting your thoughts roam for a short while longer, your eyes meet Eren’s again. “… Can we stay out here just a little longer?”

It’s already been a few hours, the sun long-since having set into the distant horizon. Hilariously, it’s the safest time of all—you and Eren had learned and trusted by the fact that wild titans fell into a slumber of their own shortly after the sunlight fell away into the evening.

The titan thinks, and then purrs in agreement. It’s not as if another titan could take either of you by surprise even if they were still roaming about, not with how open the land was—the forest was only a sprint away by Eren standards on top of that, so there was minimal risk for either of you to enjoy such a simple pleasure as watching the night sky.

Your heart feels full and warm. Though there’s not a way for you to put your finger on the exact set of emotions swirling within you, happiness is at least one of them. For being healthy. Being comfortable. Not being alone.

You reach a hand up towards Eren’s face with a gentle, encouraging hum. He instinctively lowers himself closer to you, until his face is close enough for you to touch the bridge of his nose with the flat of your palm.

“Hey, Eren,” the words come out softly, as if whispering a secret, and you can _feel_ his gaze on you. It’s so close and so heavy that it rivals the depth of the very sky above. “… thank you for bringing me out here.”

The massive titan purrs. The noise surrounds you, comforting as a blanket, while the low rumbling moves through your arm and into your entire body.

After deciding you’re done stargazing, you shift up onto your knees and twist around so that you could face Eren properly, though his face is still close enough to touch—in fact, the moment that you’re sitting up and facing him, he pushes himself forwar so that the bridge of his nose bumps against your body. The purring echoes ever deeper through your body, from the top of your head to the bottom of your feet, but the epicenter of such a gentle quake lies right at the center of your chest and belly.

At one time the strength of something as simple as a noise from him often caught you off-guard, but you’ve since come to find it as a familiar comfort—one of the simplest notions of affection that the titan could offer you openly and without any restraint.

You open your arms wide enough that you can brush your fingertips over each side of his face, over sharp cheekbones and up, gently tracing beneath his half-lidded eyes. Purring all the while, Eren takes to the physical praise almost like a cat—lulled and content, though you can still feel his heavy gaze on you the whole time. There’s no escaping the titan’s sharp gaze, not that you would want to in the first place.

_He has very handsome eyes._

It takes you a moment to realize that you’ve said that last part out loud. Eren’s eyes, no longer half-lidded, stare at you as if trying to decipher the words properly. You assume he might be confused, whether in a lack of understanding of the notion of ‘handsome’ or simply because he doesn’t understand how his eyes _are_ handsome, but that notion is quickly dashed when he pulls his face back just enough to see the whole of his expression.

There’s something in his eyes that you can’t quite understand, and you’ve seen the titan through a variety of situations and emotions to have a basic grasp on how he often felt. But where you’d seen joy, frustration, concern and even fear—this is something entirely new, or something you’re at least unfamiliar with. Something you can’t quite place.

And why does it make your heart _flutter_?

Your eyes quickly turn away and off to the side with cheeks burning so hot that they're almost aflame. A heat so hot that not even the kiss of night air against your skin can soothe it, even as it whips and twirls through the flowerbed around you.

Eren makes a noise that draws your attention towards him again, heat yet simmering in your face and belly alike. You wonder if he feels the same heat in his body--if he _can_ feel that same heat as you. Eren’s body already burns to the touch, enough to feel even through your clothes if concentrated upon, and oftentimes a great comfort on cold nights you’d prefer to be snuggled against the curve of his throat and shielded from sight beneath his dark hair.

Eren has that same look in his eyes. Enigmatic and heavy, not having faded an ounce. If nothing else it looks even _stronger_ to you than before, as if he's all but fighting against his own resolve. You never wanted to know what he’s thinking more in your entire life. 

He makes a noise again--a soft, low huff, one that makes the flowers shiver in front of his face from the force of his breath.

And then his mouth opens, jaw parting just enough for the tip of his tongue to snake out from between gleaming teeth, and moves his face closer to you again.

There was once a time where you were utterly terrified of being so close to those teeth. That jaw. That _mouth_ , if one could call it that. A time when such a motion towards you would leave your heart racing and mind bubbling over with the sharp instinct to flee as fast as your feet could move. It's certainly not an irrational fear, but it's one that's taken a long time to muffle down the back of your mind. Many days, many moments and several accidental anxiety attacks until you wouldn't be brought to tears by something like this. Until both mind and heart alike could trust that he wouldn’t end you with but one simple, decisive motion.

And you trust Eren.

But it doesn't change the fact that you're still confused, even up until the very moment that a sudden but gentle pressure is against your chest--one of his hands, pressing the pad of a thumb against the front of your body until you're falling back into the flowers again.

“What are you-” the words tumble out with more embarrassment than fear, though it doesn't take long to get an answer in the form of a hot, wet tongue sliding up from the center of your chest to the underside of your jaw. “E-Eren! St-ooop! That t-tickles!”

And it does, despite the fact that Eren himself is a 15-meter giant with a maw so fearsome that you've personally watched it tear apart other titans to bloody shreds. And here he is, the very same creature with the very same eyes of fire, gingerly licking at the front of your body like some overexcited puppy.

And instead of screaming, you’re laughing. Giggling, body almost shaking from the force of your amusement and his tongue pressing up the length of your chest in quick, playful swipes.

“Ereeen-” the name falls from your lips elongated and taut. For all the fearsome power that this titan has over you, all it would take is a firm shout or even a fervent press of your hands against his cheekbones or the bridge of his nose for him to pull away. He’s always respected even the smallest notions of dislike in all the times previous that he’s gotten anywhere close to this level of intimacy, but there’s something so discernibly different that the realization itself is almost as hot as the emotions themselves:

You don’t want him to stop.

No, not with how close he is. How warm. How his eyes watch you even now, always gauging your reaction in a way that goes far beyond what you can decipher from his enigmatic gaze. What is he thinking now, you wonder. What does he want?

What do _you_ want?

It’s probably the same thing.

In the few moments of your thought, Eren’s hot tongue has slowed from quick and little swipes up to the underside of your jaw to lingering at your throat. One massive hand presses into the flowers beside you, while the other so delicately hovers just above you, his thumb barely pressing against the curve of your stomach. All the while, he watches. He _watches_. His hair falls like a dark curtain around you, almost hiding out the entire world outside of this one moment, this one exchange of intimacy and closeness—it’s hard not to fall into the gentle abyss of Eren’s eyes, all but glowing in the shadow of his downturned face.

And then, you realize that he’s stopped licking you entirely, though the warmth and wetness of his tongue lingers. This would be about the time that you’d tell him by word or action to stop, and Eren would always do so without hesitation.

But you don’t want him to stop this time.

With trembling hands, you reach towards the buttons of your shirt and begin undoing them one by one, eyes all the while locked with the heavy glow of emeralds that hone on with each and every little twitch of your fingers against worn cotton. Little by little, you feel the cold night air brush against your exposed skin; it doesn’t make you shiver quite as much as how Eren follows the motion down until the very last button lay undone, and your chest bare beneath his gaze.

“…I can’t have you ruining what few clothes I’ve got,” you finally murmur, eyes flicking shyly to one side. “So, you know. Is this…good?”

When he doesn’t give you any sort of response, you have to look back into Eren’s eyes. For a moment you’re fearful and embarrassed that you’d gone completely over a line, misread something even in the interactions between the two of you. Anxiety forces you to half-expect to find Eren confused or perhaps even annoyed at the notion, but-

You find something else entirely in the titan’s gaze when you look into his eyes. From abyssal pools of endless darkness, outlined by only a sliver of green; you can finally see the emotion within them that has been eluding you since he first pushed you down into the flowerbed.

Raw and unrestrained: the emotion is lust.

The realization itself is enough to make breath fall still over your lips, but Eren is seemingly not content with letting you passively decipher what the moment has quickly slid into. You feel the pressure of his thumb against your belly move lower, across your hips, pausing only to hover at the spot where your legs come together while the line of his index finger presses up against the side of your body.

You feel so small.

It’s not as if this is a new revelation of fact, but there’s such a difference between being small compared to Eren, and small _beneath_ Eren. The way his eyes make you feel as if you’re the only thing in the world he cares about, or how his hand practically cradles you while the heat of his skin makes you want nothing more than to tear off every single layer left on you.

The question of whether Eren even knows what he’s doing has long since left your thoughts—there is no denying that he knows _exactly_ what he’s doing. It’s in the way he starts to just barely press the pad of his thumb over your hips, or how his eyes hone in on your face as if searching for a response. The gentle curiosity of a new lover.

And despite the rushing sound of a heartbeat in your ears, you somehow manage to find enough sense and sanity to speak.

“Eren,” his voice spills softly over your lips. You can see the soft movement of his eyes, so slight that it’s nearly imperceivable in how his focus suddenly moves to that of your mouth. Upon noticing, you part your lips without a word, and slowly pass your tongue across them, and then the edge of your teeth, with an exaggerated motion.

You can practically feel the way Eren’s eyes follow it.

“So,” you finally murmur, a smile naturally pulling against your lips. “Do you have a thing for me saying your name, or do you just like watching my mouth move?”

Eren finally offers something of a more obvious response, though it’s simply a huff—indignant, you somehow know. Can titan’s blush? You suddenly yearn to know the answer, convinced otherwise that there’s the slightest of color tinting over his cheeks, but there’s hardly enough time to start pondering about it before you feel Eren’s thumb press across your hips again—this time, dragging against the hem of your worn pants, not so much trying to take them off of you as simply remind you they’re still there.

Oh. You didn’t expect yourself to have such a sudden reaction to his insistence, but yet your belly twists at the thought of him being almost _desperate_ to have you naked. You had but faint ideas at what he planned to do after the fact, but your mind can only take one thing at a time with your heart hammering away like it is.

“Move your hand back and I’ll take care of it.”

Eren seems apprehensive, but slowly pulls his hand away from you, letting the chilly air to brush almost uncomfortably against the parts of your body that had found his heat so wonderful. You try not to waste any time, but there’s a gentle shake to your hands even as you discard the last of the clothes on your upper body. The weight of Eren’s eyes follow each and every motion, from the way your shoulders shift to slide off your shirt to how your hands start to undo the belt and fasteners on your pants.

You feel a little awkward, if only because you’re hyper aware that you’re stripping down in front of a very _large_ and very _attentive_ audience, but there’s something equally comforting in knowing that it’s Eren watching you, hovering over you with his shadow as if a protective cage that could never break.

You’re practically trembling by the time your body is bare, though it is only partially due to the soft chill in the air. Standing with your legs together and your hands pulled up shyly against your chest, you finally glance back up at the titan above you.

“W-well,” you whisper, if only because you barely have the confidence to be louder, to acknowledge that you’re naked and buzzing with arousal so much that you’re shaking from it. There’s a warmth all over your body that seems to rival that of Eren’s own natural heat, though concentrated largely between your legs, in your belly, across your face and even at the tips of your ears.

You take a small step forward and stare up at Eren expectantly. “What do you want me to do?”

The response is so sudden, Eren’s hand coming back up next to your body, but this time it’s with his thumb to your bare belly, primary fingers at your back, and the slightest nudge of his pinky against the back of your knees to all but push your legs out from beneath you. Just a touch rougher than he’d normally be, but you fall into his hand all the same, jostled only in thought than injury.

It doesn’t take long before you find yourself nestled into the center of his hand, upper body laying against the length of Eren’s fingers while his thumb cradles you against the warmth of his palm.

And he, all the while, watches you with those _eyes_. Eyes that make your soul feel as if it’s singing, your heart as if flying, your mind hazy and hot and twisted to pieces. There’s so little you can do when you’re small enough to fit in the curve of the other’s hand. Nevertheless, you reach and gently tug Eren’s thumb up and hug it against your chest, pressing a gentle kiss to the very tip.

Eren purrs, and adjusts himself to sit cross-legged, all the while making every effort not to jostle you around. Only when he seems comfortable with the position does he pull you back towards his face and his free hand towards you. He touches the tip of his index finger to the side of your face in a motion as something of a caress, stroking down the side of your face, over the curve of your shoulder, and then down the rest of your body from ribcage to ankle.

The tremble of your body is telltale, but not for fear.

Eren purrs again, seeming to enjoy the response, and does it again, and again, all the while letting the tip of his index finger closer and closer inward—until he’s stroking down the center of your chest and ending just shy of where you _really_ want to be touched. Where your body aches and belly flips at the mere thought of being at the mercy of a lover with such a size and strength disparity that they could leave you shaking with one orgasm after another.

“ _Ereh--_ ” the syllables pass over your tongue as little more than a faint sigh, but the titan hones his eyes to your face all the same. You tremble, body starting to shift and move almost on its own accord in a desperate attempt to push your hips up whenever you feel the heat of his touch down the center of your body. “Er…en… Please… I want _more_.” You shut your eyes tight and clutch at his thumb even harder, the heat of your cheeks practically boiling. “ _I want to feel you_.”

There’s a noise that comes from the center of the titan’s chest. It’s harder than a purr—and so strong that you can even feel it emanating from him in a dull rumble that works all the way up to the tips of his fingers and against your back. Something more akin to a growl, so carnal that the noise itself makes the heat at the apex of your thighs feel like a fire. Blazing. Burning. If you didn’t know any better, it might seem as though Eren is akin to a beast waiting to lay claim, to mark and possess and devour—

He doesn’t allow you to finish the thought. Before you even have the chance to take in a breath, Eren leans his face closer until he’s bumping his nose against the center of your chest and practically nuzzling the entirety of your body. If you could just barely feel the noise before, it’s suddenly _everywhere_ now. All around you, the air utterly buzzing with the sound of the titan’s fervent affection. From the top of your head to the bottom of your feet, chest to belly and belly to—

_Oh._

When you make a soft noise, Eren grows louder. Presses just a little harder against you, until you start to squirm and shift between his hand and face. The newness of the situation and all the emotions welling up within you is enough to set your nerves ablaze with exhileration—and you want _more_. As if you’ve taken but a single sip from the vastness of a lake, you suddenly realize how much there is to Eren you don’t know, how much you haven’t felt, and how much there is of him he’s willing to give you.

You want it all.

“Please,” you whine, arching your back when Eren nuzzles you in such a way that his low, rumbling purr sends delightful shivers down the core of your body. “ _Please. Eren.”_

When your shifts to meet with his own, Eren’s eyes merely gaze back with a half-lidded look of hunger and mischief. He’s teasing you on purpose. On _purpose_. Suddenly, a new heat all but surges through your body, though you’re not sure if it’s more from embarassment or arousal—just what _does_ Eren know about this? What else is he hiding behind those eyes?

He’s certainly not apt to tell you right now, for reasons obvious and not. Beause before your mind even has the time to fully process the new information he is already turning his face, so that you can watch his jaw drop and the tip of his tongue extend beyond the lipless maw. You don’t even have the chance to squirm before you feel it brush against your ankle—Eren, having expected it or not, keeps you pinned against his palm with a thumb. Not at all enough pressure to harm you or even impede your ability to breathe, but certainly enough to keep your top-half from moving. With his other hand, he just as carefully strokes an index finger down and between your legs—but this time, instead of repeating the motion, he gently slides your legs apart and keeps them open.

All while you feel the hot, wet drag of his tongue sliding up the side of your calf.

Fear and arousal, though in unequal measures, twist and mix within the pit of your belly to only stoke the flames burning within you. You know that Eren would never do anything to hurt you, but the mere notion that he _could_ , or rather that he is being so utterly gentle despite the fact, is enough to make you whimper.

His tongue slides higher. You moan again, trying desperately to squirm but being completely unable to move by the simple press of his fingertips over your body. Closer and closer up your leg, accompanied by slow, forceful breaths of hot air that seem to chase away the cold nearly as much as the burning heat of Eren’s palm against your back.

But he stops. He stops just short of precisely where you want the wet, messy heat of his tongue, and all you can do is sob from frustration from being unable to do so much as arch your back or push your hips out. Utterly and completely at his mercy.

You closed your eyes somewhere along the line. When you open them, it’s to a gentle haze of lust and what few tears have collected from the titan’s horrendous teasing.

And he’s watching every. Little. Detail.

But before you open your mouth to try pleading again, perhaps only to feed into the cycle of teasing and torture, Eren seems to decide that you’ve endured plenty to earn his tongue pressing up and between your legs at last. Even at the very tip, it’s wide and rough, texture nothing unlike that of a human tongue, simply far larger than your own.

But you never realized how good such a texture felt at such a large scale. Your hips instantly move against the wet, sloppy pleasure, until you are all but rutting against all of Eren’s tongue that he can fit between your legs and curl behind the curve of your ass.

At this point the only noise you can make is little more than a broken sob. Perhaps it holds the broken syllables of the titan’s name, but you’ve long-since passed by the moment when you had the vestiges of sanity to care. Right now, Eren is all that exists in your world.

His hands around you, his face rumbling above you, his tongue sliding against what feels like every important nerve in your body.

The purring has gotten even louder. What had been a possessive growl is almost a snarl, rolling through your body like the low and lingering thunder of a far-off storm. And Eren _is_ like such a force of nature, a storm, powerful and unstobbable and utterly devoted to nothing else than you in this very moment—just as he is your entire world, so you are his. You can feel the focus in the way his tongue undulates between your thighs or even in the delicate restraint in his hands and fingers.

Higher, higher, you feel yourself rise with the white-hot euphoria twisting in your belly. Words become syllables, syllables become noises, and noises become little more than sobs and moans that fall from between your lips.

Eren finally removes the finger keeping your legs spread open, and instantly you try to wrap them his tongue as best as you can—not easy, given how it continues to shake with the force of his constant growling, but it serves as the final motion that your body needs to reach the boundless crest of pleasure you’d been craving since the moment he pinned you down amid the flowers.

You cry out his name again and again and _again_ , with no filter to the noise as it echoes into the hillsides. It just feels so _good_. So perfect, utterly sublime in not only the orgasm itself, but in the rawness of the moment surrounding it—feeling every wave of fading pleasure seem to mimic a gentle but fervent slide of Eren’s tongue against you, until you’re milked of every ounce that your body can give.

Only when your body finally falls utterly limp that Eren slows, drawing his tongue back between gleaming teeth and his face far enough to look over you and the mess he’s left slick and shiny along the inside of your thighs.

Even his saliva is abnormally warm, though it makes you feel debauched and messy all the same. You smile up at Eren, lips gently curled as the moment slowly fades into a similar sort of comfort as the afterglow settling in your limbs.

“…I love you, Eren.”

It’s not inherently the first time you’ve said those words to him. You’ve said it before—both of you, exchanging the notion of affection and companionship in so many ways and words leading up to the beautiful newness of this moment between you.

From nights spent curled against his throat, or days where he spent carrying you against his chest to keep you safe while looking for what would be your new home. From days that you spent braiding flowers into his hair, or how he’s gone utterly out of his way and beyond obligation simply to make you smile.

The two of you have been saying those words for a long time, but the admission itself feels so heavy in importance and significance. You sit up, trying to ignore the slickness between your legs, and gaze lovingly up at the person who’s become your whole world—no, your whole universe.

And Eren looks at you in kind, his eyes unreadable only in that you can’t read the exact thoughts behind them. But you can feel the depth behind them, so much that it hardly matters to you that he can’t speak those same words to you in kind—because he already does in all the ways that matter most.

And you know if nothing else, there’s love in the way he looks at you now—you can _feel_ the weight of it.

But you can _also_ suddenly feel the chill in the air again, now that nothing else is distracting you from the way it nips at your bare (and wet) skin. Holding crossed arms close against your chest, you look to Eren in a moment of vulnerable nervousness now that the realization’s come back to you that you’re in an open field, clothes off and lost somewhat to the darkness, and you’re absolutely exhausted.

Eren tilts his head to the side after a few moments, ever so slightly, and gently pulls you towards his body until he’s all but cupping you against the base of his throat. It takes you a few moments to realize he doesn’t intend to put you down at all, but keeps his hand curled around your body to tent in the heat coming from his skin and keeping you warm.

“I guess we can gather up my clothes tomorrow,” You say, loud enough for him to hear. “And if not, then you owe me some new pants at the very least, mister.”

Eren huffs in what you know is amusement, and slowly begins to stand to his feet. Once he seems satisfied with the way you’re tucked up against him, the titan moves back towards the safety of the forest overlooking the flower-laden hillside.

It’s only a minute or two later, when you’re fading into the embrace of sleep, that you realize the gentle, rhythmic noise coming from Eren’s chest isn’t just the titan’s purrs, but his heartbeat.

And it makes you fall into the gentle darkness with a content smile on your face.

* * *

* * *

...

Elsewhere, many miles away and tucked inside the safety of Wall Rose, Levi lifts his eyes from the rim of his teacup. He stares at the person on the other side of the table for a few moments before raising an eyebrow.

“You’ve gone quiet all of a sudden,” he notes lowly. “Did you finally run out of things to talk about with your research?”

Though it wouldn’t be the worst thing in the world to have a few minutes of silence whenever his fellow Scout was taking a break with him, Levi couldn’t help but admit he enjoyed to hear their constant rambling of topics he neither cared about or properly understood. Hanji has always been one of the most unique of the regiment, so much so that there are plenty of people who see them as completely insane for how much they loved all things titan.

But Levi honestly enjoyed it. He enjoys their passion, their enthusiasm, and while he doesn’t inherently look as though he cares half the time, it strikes him as strange when Hanji all but stops mid-sentence and falls completely silent over their still-full cup of tea.

They lean over their folded hands, eyes peering down at the dark liquid with a look so focused that Levi wonders if the tea would start to boil under the pressure.

But then Hanji’s eyes lift up to his own, and they whisper, “I feel like there’s something important happening right now, somewhere. Something absolutely imperative to the foundation of my research—I can practically feel it in the air. History is being made right as we speak.”

They all but jump up from the table, hands slamming down onto the wood in a dramatic show of passion that Levi is more relieved than surprised to hear. Ah, yes, one of _those_ moments.

Levi can’t stop the ever-so-subtle curl to the edge of his lips. “I’m sure it’s nothing you won’t eventually figure out on your own,” he says, sipping at his tea. “Otherwise, you can ask all the questions you want next time we’re outside the walls. I’m sure there’ll be plenty of titans more than _hungry_ to answer them.”

“Oh, don’t you start,” Hanji huffs, but eventually sits down, letting their face drop against the wooden surface with a _thump_ that makes their cup shake. “There is just so much we don’t know, and I have this nagging feeling in the back of my head that the answers are just _this_ close-" they make a gesture of holding their thumb and forefinger so that they're nearly touching. "The apple of knowledge is just above my head, Levi, and I’m not tall enough to reach it.”

Hanji looks up to find the captain staring at her, expression shadowed and cold.

“How unfortunate,” he says, and takes another sip. “At that point, just find a damn chair and stand on it.”

Hanji looks at him, though they either don’t notice the cold look in his eye or simply ignores it outright. They ponder on his words genuinely with a hand reaching up to stroke over their chin. “Stand on a….”

They lean back, then to the side, then back again. Such a stupid look on their face—a look Levi found endearing, to a degree.

And suddenly, Hanji leaps to their feet so quickly that one might have thought a titan had busted through the door.

“That’s it! If there’s still records of—yes, yes that might lead somewhere—!” they twist on the heel of their boot and rush out the common room with a renewed fire in their eyes, leaving Levi to simply watch their excited retreat.

He sips the last drops of his tea, and smiles.


	7. "I love you."

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Three words that can mean a lot, but they mean everything when they come from _him_.

Your heart almost stops when you hear the sounds that come out of Eren’s mouth. Once the moment passes with your heartbeat continuing on without issue, you blink at him in a combination of shock and wonder. 

“What…did you say?”

You don’t mean for the words to sound the way they do. It’s not like you’re offended or angry, nor do you mean to ask them as some sort of accusation–you simply could not believe what you even _might_ have heard the man attempt to say. 

Eren stands just a few feet away from you, brows knitted together in something of annoyance, though it’s not at all directed at you. He drops his jaw, then closes it, and then makes the motion a second time.

“I luh…yeeu.”

It takes a moment more for it to hit you square in the face.

 _I love you_.

You know that he’s been acclimating to being a human again. Though there were some things that seemed to come easy enough to the shifter, one of the hardest proved to be one of the things that frustrated him the most–speaking. He couldn’t say how long he’d been a titan, and Hanji guessed it anywhere up to a decade of his life. A decade of living in an entirely different form, perhaps for as long as he had been a human prior to that. 

He didn’t exactly have lips in his titan form and thus, speaking with the addition of lips, even if he could understand someone speaking to him perfectly well, was a talent he was trying to re-learn.

The sounds requiring the use of his lips were the hardest for him to make.

You set down the plate you were washing and step closer to Eren, hands reaching out until they fold into his own. His eyes watch you smile, then say,

“I love you.” you notice how Eren’s eyes seem to hone in on your lips and how they move against teeth and tongue in an otherwise simple phrase. “I… lo _ **ve**_ …y _ **ou**_.”

You emphasize the letters giving him the most trouble, heart hammering in a pure rush of adrenaline the whole time.

Eren’s brows knit tighter, but he carefully parts his lips and speaks that gentle, low voice of his, “I… love… y-… you…”

“I love you too!” you all but laugh, joyful in how such simple, sweet words mean so much–not just in the notion, since you and Eren have been in love for what feels like forever–but in the fact that he can now _tell_ you.

And he seems just as happy in the fact, if not moreso. You watch as the corners of his lips pull back into a smile–one that looks fairly average at first glance, if one didn’t take notice of the way the edges seemed a little wide, or how there seemed to be the slightest glint of teeth where there shouldn’t be.

But that’s hardly important. All you care about is pushing yourself into Eren’s chest and wrapping your arms tight around him–and he does the same, whispering slowly all the while “I love you… I love you… so muh-much.”


	8. Braids and Rainstorms

You often find yourself wondering if his hair is analogous to your own--that is to say, human. The rest of Eren seemed human enough otherwise; two arms, two legs, standing upright and with (most) of all the parts found in a human anatomy book. Still, you couldn’t help but wonder how the details worked out. How different the two of you truly are outside of size and the like. 

Certainly there’s a doctor or scientist of some sort that would have a field day with Eren as a test subject--though you’re content to sit and idly wonder.

His hair is so soft against your carding fingertips; it reminded you of the few times a fellow cadet had asked for your help, to make sure their hair wouldn’t fly in their face during the ODM gear training. It’s years after the fact, but you can still remember how soft it felt against your fingertips.

Braiding such a shaggy mess was a challenge regardless of how individual handfuls felt, however, since the action was more like braiding thick wool roving than hair--but it is hair nonetheless, and giving you plenty of distraction from the otherwise uneventful day.

A good day, all things considered.

The sun has fallen behind thick clouds, leaving the sky above rather dreary with a faint promise of late afternoon rain. It doesn't worry you all that much, but the thought of getting uncomfortably wet through the night is never pleasant. After all, the last rainstorm lasted two entire days and left you soaked to the bone and shaking like a leaf, even with Eren’s hands all but cupped around you as if you were a frightened baby bird.

With a sigh, you turn our eyes back to the macro-scaled braid that you'd been working on for the last hour at least, with each plait emphasized with a collection of small blossoms you'd picked early this morning. 

Eren himself is napping against one of the outermost trees of the giant forest, you perched upon his shoulder which moves gradually beneath your feet with every of his breaths.

For how fearsome he could be, you love seeing him look so peaceful; eyes closed, posture loose, attention as soft as his gentle breathing.

"It looks like it's gonna rain tonight," you say, half to yourself as it is to the sleeping titan beneath you. “But maybe they’ll pass us by.”

Eren must be only half asleep, because you feel his body gently tremor with a huff--a notion that he is actively listening, if the twitch of his ear didn't already indicate that. 

You sigh, "I hope that adding those coats to the roof will keep it from dripping water like last time."

Eren huffs again, but softer. More like a sigh.

One of your palms rub down the length of the braid that you can reach. It looks good on him. From the top of his head down, against the side of his face and in front of his ear, bespeckeled with little white blooms that look like stars amid the dark brown of his hair. 

Though you doubt the braid would hold for very long given the oncoming showers, there's still a sense of joy and wonder in the act that made it. Eren or not, to be allowed such a domestic gesture with such a massive titan holds more trust than you think you'd ever have with another person. To know he's letting you, to know he's comfortable with you.

That you're just as comfortable with him.

You carefully shuffle and shift until you're able to press your body beneath the curve of Eren's throat, hands outstretched in a motion as close to a hug as you can manage. His pulse thumps rhythmically against you, deep and low with his heartbeat.

_Ba-dum... Ba-dum... Ba-dum...._

He turns his head ever so slightly, tucking you beneath his chin and bringing up a hand to press against your back so the motion didn't make you fall.

He's so warm. You feel a gentle tug of sleep at your eyes, and yawn, "Can I take a nap for a little while too?"

Eren brushes a thumb over the center of your back, and hums lowly in reply.

It's answer enough for you, so you curl yourself against the titan's neck, hidden just slightly behind the dark curtain of his hair. If the braid comes undone, then you'll simply do it again. And again. And again--if only to feel such a soft, gentle connection with the titan who allows such a fragile creature to do so.

As you fall asleep to the warmth of Eren's body heat, he merely glances out towards the horizon, where the clouds meander ever closer with the promise of rain.

It's a good day.


	9. Breeding Confusion [1/2]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eren has been avoiding you. You think he might be angry, though you have no idea why, so you ask for some advice from Hanji and Levi to figure out why the man who is otherwise always glued to your side has suddenly started to distance himself.
> 
> As it turns out, the truth is far simpler (and obvious) than you could have ever imagined.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This entry is being posted in two parts--partially because I didn't expect the first part to get quite as long as it became (and I absolutely LOVE this interaction between the reader, Hanji and Levi) and also because the next part is just going to be 300% smut. 
> 
> So if you're avoiding the NSFW content, then you don't have to worry about reading [the second part](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28830591/chapters/74016033) to this entry! But if you're not, then be on the lookout for some kinky feral Eren smut in the next part UvU

“I think he’s avoiding me.”

Heat starts to creep up your cheeks from the moment that the last word leaves your lips. It’s almost silly, really, to admit the fact you feel like your partner is avoiding you when he’s normally otherwise glued to your hip. Is it selfish to think so?

Hanji and Levi stare at you from across the table. While the former has a gentle look of sympathy in their eyes, Levi’s expression is as unreadable and cold as it ever is—and you don’t expect any different. He sips at his tea while Hanji, after a moment, unclasps their hands and makes a gesture as if they’re trying to find the right words to their thoughts.

“What makes you think that he’s avoiding you?” they ask, trying to be gentle.

Levi scoffs before you can answer, “It’s not like that overgrown brat hasn’t been weird before.”

“I know,” you sigh, staring down into the reflective surface of your drink. It hadn’t been touched, despite having spent the last half hour with the two Scouts in the hopes they’d either confirm your worry or assure you of how stupid it sounded. “I just… something feels _off_ about him, and it’s not something he’s telling me about.”

“I thought you and him had some sort of-” Levi makes a gesture with a hand and raises a brow in a modicum of curiosity. “-thing. Being able to read one another and the like.”

You purse your lips together for a moment, “I’m intuitive about him, not psychic.”

Heat flows ever hotter in your cheeks, though you know the man means well in his words. For all the disparity of first impressions, the entire scout regiment has become something of an extended family for you and Eren alike… even if they had the two of you on the edge of a blade after the battle of Trost.

Hanji reaches out and pats your arm, gently pulling you from the memories and turning your eyes back up to their face that seems to beam with a smile.

“I’m sure it’s something perfectly reasonable—after all, he’s still getting used to his human form, right?”

Hanji knew the answer, they’d been the one heading the various forms of therapy to make Eren feel comfortable in his human body. But it makes their words feel all the more comforting, because there is a point to be made. It’s not as if Eren’s situation is typical; hell, _your_ situation is hardly typical. The two of you have been something of a packaged deal for long enough.

The mug has gone cold between your palms.

“You have a point,” the words fall in a sigh over your lips. “But it’s just strange for him to stay away from me—not even physically, that’s fine, if he needs the space. But ever since a couple weeks ago, he hasn’t even looked at me a lot. And when he does…”

You aren’t sure how to describe it. The look in his eyes, the raging forestfire of emerald all but glowing beneath the broken curtain of hair over his face. It felt just as heavy as a titan, pressing down on your shoulders with a force that made your heart race and your body shake.

But… you’ve seen it before.

Brows knit together in confusion as you give more thought to the brief moments of eye contact. Trying to place why that look of his felt almost familiar, though you can’t understand for a moment where he’d look almost _furious_ at you like that. And is that the reason he’s avoiding you to begin with? Had you done something wrong, something to anger him?

“Hey.”

If Levi’s sharp tone didn’t pull you out of your mind, then the flick of his index finger against your forehead does—stinging for a moment as you let out a soft yelp of pain.

“So mean, Levi,” Hanji muses, taking a sip of their drink.

“Just keeping heads out of the clouds,” he argues lowly, but keeps his gaze on you all the same. “Worrying like that rarely fixes anything anyways.”

The man leans back as you bring a hand to rub away the lingering pain at the center of your forehead, vaguely annoyed but grateful all the same that these two are so willing to listen to what you feared might have sounded childish and silly. Maybe it’s just because you’d spent the last couple years with literally only Eren for something of company. Maybe that companionship was as much a hindrance as a help for your sanity, and you’re simply getting used to the idea of both you and Eren having your own separate hobbies and free time.

But something about those _looks_. So familiar, nagging so hard at the back of your mind that it’s literally gnawing onto your thoughts.

Where?

Where have you seen it?

And then, suddenly, it comes to you:

> _You find something else entirely in the titan’s gaze when you look into his eyes. From abyssal pools of endless darkness, outlined by only a sliver of green; you can finally see the emotion within them that has been eluding you since he first pushed you down into the flowerbed._
> 
> _Raw and unrestrained: the emotion is lust._
> 
> _The realization itself is enough to make breath fall still over your lips, but Eren is seemingly not content with letting you passively decipher what the moment has quickly slid into. You feel the pressure of his thumb against your belly move lower, across your hips, pausing only to hover at the spot where your legs come together while the line of his index finger presses up against the side of your body-_

“Eren wants to fuck me.”

The room is silent. Time, as if frozen, feels as heavy as stone and just as cold. Neither Hanji nor Levi say a thing, looking at you instead with various states of incredulous shock painted over their faces. And you are too far into the clutch of realization to understand the utter ridiculousness of what you’d just said. He wants to _fuck_ you. That look in his isn’t anger, not fury, but powerful all the same in a way that had taken you forever to realize the very first time the two of you had-

“You’re saying the brat is _horny_?”

Levi looks almost annoyed, finally setting down his cup with an audible thud against the wooden surface. The heat from before returns with a vengeance, rolling over your face so quickly that it might have given you whiplash.

You sputter out an answer, “W-well no—I mean, yes. I think. It’s the same look he’s given me before, as a titan, when we-”

Levi’s hand shoots out and pushes a finger to your lips.

“Please don’t.”

“Speak for yourself, Levi,” Hanji says, a literal sparkle in their eyes as they lean farther over the table and pull the captain back. “This is utterly _fascinating_ information. But, at the same time-” they let out a breath and tilt their head to the side. “-why don’t you and Eren just…”

You stare at them, blinking in confusion when their words trail off into silence.

“Just what?”

“You know,” Hanji shrugs their shoulders. “Have sex?”

“But we’ve never had sex with him as a human.”

In that moment, several things happen all at once. Hanji’s expression suddenly shifts into something utterly _manic_ , and the door behind where all three of you sit opens to the sound of dull, heavy footsteps. While the fevered researcher is all too busy to take your hands and look at you with all the excitement of a five-year-old child, Levi’s attention turns instead to the person that has entered the room.

“Ah, Erwin,” he says in something of a welcome, expression utterly unchanged. “What do you want?”

“I heard that there’s been some ongoing trouble with Eren and wanted to see if I could help.”

“No need, we already figured out the problem,” Levi deadpans. “Fucking brat just needs to get laid.”

You can’t see Erwin’s expression and neither can he see yours, but your entire _body_ is on fire for how hot it feels all at once.

Then there’s silence, but it lasts only for a few heartbeats.

“In that case,” Erwin finally says, tone just as calm and serious as Levi looks. “Then I’ll leave _that_ kind of help in the capable hands of someone else.”

After that, his words are punctuated by the sound of the door closing and footsteps retreating back down the hall towards Erwin’s office just a bit faster than when they originally approached. Hanji hasn’t let go of your hands for a single moment, eyes alight with such a fierce curiosity and determination that it almost scares you.

“So you’re telling me that you and Eren have had sexual relations-” they say, Levi’s groan momentarily interrupting the words. “-but only while he’s in titan form?”

“Yes?” Your voice is barely that of a squeak.

“And you think he currently wants to have sexual relations with you now, but while he’s human?”

“Do you _have_ to word it like that?”

Beside them, Levi leans his chin over the back of his hand. “It’s only going to get worse. Just wait until they start breaking out the medical language.”

“Hey!” Hanji turns their fierce gaze towards the captain. “This is an incredible opportunity to understand something within the titan psyche.”

“Tch,” the man rolls his eyes. “You’re just a voyeur with a science kink.”

Hanji groans and turns back towards you, otherwise undeterred by Levi’s insult. The excited sparkle in their eyes is restrained, but only vaguely—their hands still clasp yours with an intense fierceness.

It’s not like you and Eren haven’t been under scrutiny and observation before. Ever since being allowed into the safety of the walls, you’d grown used to the constant curiosity and questioning that often came your way, and you doubt that Eren received much the same treatment whenever he was in their presence. But Hanji, despite all that you expected at being all but forced into scout custody, was kind and understanding, even when they had no need or obligation to be.

So you’re not _afraid_ of that fierceness, but you are a fair bit intimidated by it instead. Worried for the questions that floated in the researchers head, because you know in your heart of hearts they’d stop at absolutely _nothing_ to get answers, shy of Levi or Erwin outright commanding them to stop.

“So,” Hanji murmurs, expression expectant. “How do _you_ feel about this?”

You blink.

“What?”

“I mean how do you _feel_ about him wanting to have sex with you in this particular situation?”

You blink again, still just as confused despite the attempt at clarification. If there’s a point, then you certainly haven’t discovered it quite yet, still wrapped up in the realization that Eren has been practically lusting over you from a distance for the last two weeks—the telltale look of ravenous hunger in his eyes seems obvious now, in hindsight, but you’d been too worried about him being angry at you for some unknown reason or another.

“I-” the words get stuck somewhere in your throat. “I don’t-… Uh…”

Only then do you bring the mug of cold tea to your lips, chugging it down as if in attempt to dislodge words from your tongue and thoughts from your mind. Gods above, this is by far the last conversation you expected to fall into when you asked if Levi and Hanji wanted to have a drink with you.

Hanji rubs a thumb against the back of your hands, and even Levi’s gaze has settled on you again—discernably softer, though you scarcely have the time to read into someone elses’ thoughts when you’re barely aware of your own.

“I think I want to?”

“You _think,_ " Levi repeats slowly.

You groan and drop your face to the table’s surface, forehead thudding gently against it. “It’s not like we haven’t done _things_ before. I’m just… I was so _scared_ that he was mad about something I did. I’m more confused than unwilling, you know?”

You let your head lie on the table for a few seconds, content in the gentle darkness that it offered your eyes. It’s not as if Eren hasn’t been forward in his advances before he learned how to shift. There are plenty of times easily plucked from the top of your memories where he’d been the complete opposite of shy in letting you know how he felt when he wanted you writhing and moaning—whether it was in the warmth of his hand, grinding on his tongue, carefully perched over his mouth, the vibrations of his growling and purring bringing to you end after end and-

God. You let your face linger on the table’s surface for longer, if only so that you don’t have to face the two people you considered friends and family alike to even catch a _hint_ at the memories flashing behind your eyes. Hanji continues to rub the back of your hand in a semblance of comfort.

“Maybe he’s misinterpreting you too,” they point out. “In a couple of his speech therapy lessons, he’s mentioned being afraid of hurting you.”

“As a human?” you turn your head just enough to catch sight of Hanji’s face—and their expression is honest.

“Of course! It’s honestly not _that_ surprising either. Like-” they pull their hands back and wiggle their fingers in something of emphasis. “-right now, I know exactly how to use my hands with precision. To grip the hilt of my ODM blades and to even pull the trigger—it requires a careful balance of dexterity and strength in even that simple of a motion.

If I didn’t have that sort of familiarity with my own body, I might squeeze too hard, maybe even break the trigger without realizing it. If you think of Eren as being in that kind of situation then makes sense that he’d be careful—I imagine that he’s still trying to learn the limits of his body without putting you in danger of it. He’s certainly not 15 meters tall, but the human jaw is an _incredibly_ strong weapon if used without restraint.”

Your eyes look to Hanji in something of gentle awe. For someone who could oftentimes be seen as eccentric and strange, they carried such a respectable sense of empathy for others. It’s no surprise they are as respected among the scouts for such equal amounts of intelligence and skill.

And then, hilariously, it’s Levi’s unwavering tone that breaks the moment cleanly—and purposefully—in half.

“Just strip in front of him,” he says, the slightest hint of a smirk at the corners of his lips. “I bet that will get the point across strongly enough.”

You groan and lay your face on the table again.


	10. Bath Time

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sometimes you wonder what’s harder: bathing Eren as a human, or as a titan. Either way, he’s pretty feral about it.

Eren already looked something akin to a wet dog if not in body, but in spirit. The way his long hair stuck to his face and neck, one green eye barely peeking out from behind the dark curtain hiding his expression—it almost makes your heat twist a little when you pour another bucket of water over him. The man doesn’t sputter, but shakes his head vigorously as if to shake off the droplets itself.

“The more you squirm, the longer it takes,” you remind him before letting your body sink back into the comfortable warmth of the bath. “I can’t wash your hair if it isn’t wet enough.”

Still, Eren shakes his head like a nervous dog, sending water flying every which way across the bathroom.

“No!” you instinctively reach hold your arms up to keep the spray from your face, and then quickly reaching forward to gently—but firmly—hold your hands on either side of the man’s head. “How is it that you’re easier to bathe as a _titan_ than a human?”

Eren, despite having all the capacity to say words, chooses to forgo them for an annoyed whine. A literal puppy in all but physicality when presented with the oppressive force of hot water and soap. Maybe it has something to do with the fact that it felt less like a chore when the two of you were surviving outside the walls—more like a necessity, a small luxury of comfort and bonding whenever you had the time, energy, and access to a body of water large enough to bathe a literal titan.

You roll your eyes after a moment, “If I let you turn around so you can see me, will that help?”

Eren thinks about it for a moment, tilting his head to the side, then to the other.

“…sure,” he murmurs.

The two of you shift awkwardly in the tub until you’re sitting at either end, with Eren facing you, his eyes all but glowing green gemstones hidden in the shadow cast by his cascading hair—so long that it’s down to the middle of his back. Maybe that’s another reason—it actually takes longer to wash his hair when there’s just so _much_ of it. Not to mention, for whatever reason, body odor and general dirtiness never seemed to be an issue for him as a titan, though it’s hardly something you’d bring up to Hanji without any prompting.

Even while simmering in your own thoughts, it’s hard to miss the way Eren’s gaze slides down the front of your bare, wet body.

“You just like seeing me naked,” you say, tapping a finger against the center of Eren’s chest. “Is that why you’re always so difficult?”

The corner of the man’s mouth quirks.

“Maybe,” he murmurs lowly. “But I like it when you’re small t’me.”

You stare at him, caution lacing your tongue as you ask, “And why is that?”

Eren grins, wide and sharp. Wild even, given the way you can barely see his keen eyes behind the shroud of his hair.

“Because you’re so easy to pin down and ravish like that.”

Heat fills your cheeks, down your shoulders and even up to the tips of your ears, even hotter than the bath itself. There had been more than a couple times that he as a titan had done just that—and you were hardly in a position to complain about the ways he managed to leave your body stiflingly hot despite how cold the river water felt.

So surely nobody can blame you for tossing another bucket of water at Eren’s head.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Out of curiosity, do you guys think I should give the shorter, <1k word drabbles their own series, or should they stay altogether with the longer fics and ficlets?
> 
> Also, I’m doing regular livestreams of the Attack on Titan 2 game! Go follow [my twitch](%E2%80%9C) to be updated whenever I go live, we can hang out and toss ideas at one another 👌


	11. Mikasa's Discovery

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Colossal and Armored titans appear suddenly at the Trost District, throwing everything into chaos as they had five years previously. Mikasa is just one garrison member of many who expects the worst, but both help and a familiar face come in a form she would have never expected to see - a face that, as far as everyone was aware, had been dead for years.

Mikasa couldn’t believe her eyes.

No, she really couldn’t - her vision and brain were giving her entirely separate messages, so utterly different in meaning that she couldn’t begin to entertain the thought that they could _both_ be equally true. Though her mind and heart alike felt absolutely certain that the creature kneeling before her eyes was none other than Eren, her childhood friend who had been missing and presumed dead ever since the fall of Shiganshina…

The creature was also a titan. Massive. At least ten meters, if not fifteen. He towered above crumbling buildings around him, head bowed beneath the attention of several dozen garrison soldiers and their mobile canons which were all pointed at the beast and the unfamiliar human companion standing stubbornly upon his shoulder. No number of commands made them yield from their position, eyes burning like fire amidst their overall look of disarray of mended patchwork clothes - as if they haven't seen civilization for _years_.

But somehow she knew. Mikasa knew this creature - this _titan_ \- was the same young man she knew all those years ago. There was not an ounce of doubt in her mind despite the fact that she had no proof nor prayer that anyone else would listen to her.

But she tried.

If it wasn’t for her sudden defense, raising an argument against the officer all but hell-bent on killing the two of them then and there, then surely several volleys of canons would have left both titan and human a bloody mess spattered across the streets. It wasn’t as if Mikasa couldn’t understand their fear, as she was just as terrified with adrenaline still pumping in the aftermath of Trost’s near-fall. It had felt so alike the loss of her hometown that Mikasa had been brought to the very precipice of what she could handle emotionally.

But she had managed through the stifling sense of panic; the other soldiers and officers alike could do the same.

Even though fear felt cold and sick within her stomach, Mikasa held firm enough to question the order given to her to pass down the line, trusting the steadfastness of her gut and the facts laying obvious just beyond the narrow view of the titan before them all.

Trost was saved, the hole plugged in the wall by a massive boulder only the titan before them could have moved. And he did. Against everything Mikasa knew and thought was unwavering truth about the creatures, this single one went against it all and saved the entire district alongside the strange person who yet stood unwaveringly loyal on his shoulder. At minimum it could be labeled an abnormal, an extremely unique one at that. Even if she was wrong, Mikasa could read the sudden shift in the battlefield to know when the real fighting was over: this titan and the strange person on his shoulder seemed to mean no harm towards anyone.

And it was Mikasa's steadfastness that gave time for the scouts to arrive.

Zeke was one of the first to lay eyes upon the scene. Fear and dread continued to course through his veins even after being assured that the breach was sealed, and he wasted absolutely no time in moving to the forefront of the crowded soldiers to see what had them so occupied despite the fact that he could find no other titans roaming around Trost - Mikasa's own squad had seen well enough to that after all. She didn't gain rank so quickly without having talent. Zeke moved through the crowd until, finally, he was able to see properly what it was that had shaken the entire line of command within the garrison.

Zeke recognized the unknown titan with such forceful clarity that it was nearly a punch to the gut. He felt breathless, chilled even, as if not a single muscle in his body could move as his brain needed the time to catch up to the sight right before his eyes.

It was Eren. His baby brother. The one he thought as dead as their father, lost to an accident so many years ago. He needed no confirmation and no comparison - that titan was his brother. 

And not a soul in the walls would hurt him. Not if Zeke was still alive to bare witness.

It didn’t take long from there for word to spread and orders to supersede others, even if many soldiers were understandably confused and averse to letting any titan remain alive after all the destruction they’d bore witness to. Countless buildings destroyed and even more lives lost, and certainly no telling in where to begin what would be a lengthy process of cleanup and documentation. 

But order eventually won out, and Mikasa met with Zeke in the vague chaos that followed, a sense of safety and military hierarchy settling soothingly over fitful fear and hair-trigger decisions. The two of them didn’t need to say anything for Mikasa to see an answer clear and powerful in the elder Yeager’s eyes. The answer - and confirmation - that her gut was right. Relief flooded the woman's body as tears fell from her cheeks. 

So that was Eren.

A titan, but Eren all the same in the ways that mattered.

Mikasa was nonetheless relieved to see him alive.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Despite not posting much in the past couple weeks, I'm still kicking around in the fandom! I've actually been fairly active over on my tumblr, so consider this an extra push to check it out if you're able - I post a lot of non-fic stuff over there!
> 
> I'm nearly done with the next part of the last longfic, Breeding Confusion, so you'll likely see that as the chapter posted after this one sometime soon, though I will re-order the chapters shortly after that to make sure it comes directly after the first part so it's not confusing or such c:


	12. To You, Ten Years From Now

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> “Assuming Eren’s grown a bit since the last I saw him, I shouldn’t have much trouble cutting his human body out of the nape.”
> 
> Hanji stares at Zeke for a few moments, though their eyes remained sharply on the struggling titan.
> 
> “And if you’re wrong?” they say cautiously, tone suggesting that the two of them have discussed this before. “What if there isn’t a human body for you to pull out?”
> 
> “Then I will kill my only brother, and I alone will be responsible for that.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This was originally supposed to be a short drabble, but ended up being almost 3k because I hate how much I love writing Zeke in this AU. I think his inclusion makes for a lot of fun, and fills in a ton of plot holes that I otherwise had no idea how to knit together.
> 
> Listen I just want Zeke to have the opportunity to be a good older brother figure okay. Also because I know he and Hanji would get along SO WELL!

By the time you realized what was going on, it was already too late to do anything about it. With your hands bound and body guarded by unknown garrison faces, you were forced to sit and watch as a man approached Eren’s kneeling form. He was tall, blonde-haired and wrapped in an emerald cloak baring the symbol of the Survey Corps - but despite the obvious accolades tied to the mark, he still looked tiny compared to the massive beast before him. Just another tiny human compared to the utter vastness of a titan.

But why... was Eren looking at him like that?

You’d seen a whole range of emotions since the day you’d met the titan, but never once had you beheld such a look of shock and terror within his eyes. It’s as if he’s seeing something familiar; something - or someone - that he recognizes. It makes absolutely no sense to you since you’ve never seen the man before, though desperately do you try to place him somewhere among your memories to understand why the sight of him seems so important to Eren. All that returns to you is utter void; you have truly never seen the man before.

You try to shout or scream - to do just about anything at all to gain the attention of your companion. The strip of cloth between your teeth allows only a series of muffled screams, none of which seem to reach even Eren’s sensitive hearing despite the fact that he is yet fully within your vision, and you within his. Had he been threatened? Had _you_ been threatened? Even now, it’s hard to fully unpack the frantic moments leading up to and following Eren doing his part to quell the stream of titans getting into Trost. Confusion ran amok through the front-line soldiers even after he’d plugged the hole with a stray boulder of just the right size, and it seemed that somewhere along the hierarchy they’d chosen to see you as a threat; not someone to kill outright, at least.

And you hadn’t the chance to even offer your name or previous standing with the garrison of Quinta before they’d taken you into custody. Procedure felt sloppy from the soldiers who bound your hands tight, and there was absolutely no reason to gag you - unless there was something else to be gained with keeping you within Eren’s line of sight. Visible, but silent.

And there is still that unknown man standing before the titan.

Who _is_ he?

You stare at the scene as it unfolds before your eyes. Watch as the man’s mouth moves with words but too far to understand more than a few of them.

“... Zeke... long time... brother... Eren...”

None of the words seem to make sense together, though it doesn’t take a genius to figure out that Zeke is his own name. Zeke. Somewhere in the back of your mind, you feel as if you _have_ heard of it before, though his bearded face brings forth absolutely no sense of familiarity. If anything, it makes you feel even more cautious, mind edging on a sense of regret for letting you and Eren come to Trost’s rescue even though you were fully aware this would be your greeting back within the walls. Even knowing that his help seemed paramount to retaking the district.

Regret feels cold and bitter.

The man steps closer to Eren and, to your surprise and dismay, Eren lowers himself down further to the ground enough so that you can clearly see their gazes meet. Zeke opens his arms as a smile pulls at his lips, which only serves to confuse you more.

What is he _doing?_

* * *

“My name is Zeke Yeager,” the scout says gently, letting his eyes meet with vast pools of emerald. Eyes he had never seen once before; he recognizes the person trapped within them all the same. “I know it’s been a long time since you’ve last seen me, Eren-”

Zeke feels a stone in his throat that he’s unable to ignore.

It’s been nearly ten years.

“-but surely you remember your older brother?”

A few moments pass. Zeke feels satisfied in the look that begins to fill the titan’s gaze. Recognition. Given the fact that it would be coming to a decade since he’d last seen his younger sibling alive at all, he doubted that Eren would remember very much. For all the research their father had conducted - research that Zeke had been proud to continue - he is still working very much on assumption and theory. But he knew that there had to be _something_ in the other’s mind that would connect. And it seems that the risk is paying off. 

To think the garrison had been but a minute from outright killing him and his unfamiliar companion - if Mikasa hadn’t done anything to argue the order. Zeke was so close to losing his baby brother for a second time. But even though he can’t say for sure what may happen after this moment, he is relieved all the same. Eren is _alive_.

It answered so many questions and thensome that Zeke has been carrying silently within him for years.

The elder Yeager is pulled quite suddenly from his thoughts when he feels the ground rumbling around him and realizes, suddenly, that it’s Eren causing it. It doesn’t take more than a glance to see the way his body is shaking, causing the earth beneath him to quiver with the force of his emotions. Zeke tries to step forward with soothing words to try and guide the hapless titan back to his senses, but it quickly proves useless.

“Eren!” Zeke calls, desperately trying to read the mountain of information piling up behind the titan’s eyes.

Memories. Recognition. Remembrance. _Pain. Fear. **Terror.**_

It becomes clear all too quickly that something has snapped so quickly and with such strength that Eren himself can barely handle it. For all that Zeke wants to understand how his brother’s mind had managed to wall away so much of himself for so long, it becomes clear that the situation has changed; his training clicks into place not even a moment later, just as Eren rears his head back with a low screech and reaches a hand up as if to swipe Zeke away - the worst of it is how much pain Eren seems to be in, his mind cracking against a wave of memories that don’t seem like his own at first.

“Hanji!”

Zeke jumps back just a heartbeat before Eren’s hand collides with the spot of earth where he’d been standing. The titan looks ready to move again, even so much as shifting to stand on his two feet again as the low screeches turn to growls and snarls of a confused and terrified soul.

But he doesn’t get the chance. Before Eren can even realize it, he’s being forced back down onto the ground with a weight unlike anything he’d felt before. Hands, arms, legs and feet, all quickly forced to the ground to the sound of whistling filling the air - it’s only after he’s pinned that even onlookers can see the thick metal spikes sticking through his limbs, dropped from the dozen or so scouts that had been stationed atop the buildings around him. It’s a crude method of capture, and Zeke knew it wouldn’t work on any other titan but that of his brother on the assumption he could keep him still for long enough.

But it worked regardless.

Eren continued to growl and snarl even as he fought the spikes pinning him against the earth, eyes instinctively turning towards Zeke who met the gaze solemnly.

“I’m sorry,” he murmurs softly, and turns his face towards one of the scouts that drop beside him.

They tilt their head to the side and take in the sight of Eren with a surprising lack of horror - but such a casual response is hardly unlike Hanji. “So this one is your brother, eh?”

“Yes,” Zeke says, “though I’m not sure what kind of shape his mind is in. It’s been almost ten years since I’d last seen him as a human.”

“Well, I reckon he’s kept some of his social skills intact. He arrived with that one over there.”

Hanji jerks a thumb back towards the figure some meters away, bound by the hands and gagged into silence. Zeke turns to look and finds himself oddly impressed, if only because he can’t imagine anyone being able to survive outside the wall for any length of time.

“Got some people going through records right now to make sure, but I think we have a garrison soldier from Quinta.”

“Quinta?” Zeke’s brows pull tight over his eyes at the word. “I thought that district was destroyed shortly after Wall Maria fell.”

“Oh, it did,” Hanji smiles. “The name came up as deceased, but they sure look the part if the records are wrong.”

Someone surviving despite all the odds stacked against them. Someone making a life for themselves for nearly five years after the fall of the outermost wall - despite all of the countless hardships that such a life would have presented even without titans roaming about the wildlands.

Zeke couldn’t help how his gaze lingered upon the figure with something of respect. Before he could say anything else, however, Hanji’s voice suddenly pulled them both back to the focus of attention.

“The restraints aren’t going to hold a titan of his size for long, Zeke.”

Zeke nods and turns back towards his brother, the titan himself struggling with obvious intent against the metallic spikes; he is managing to pull them (and himself) out of the ground, little at a time.

“Assuming Eren’s grown a bit since the last I saw him, I shouldn’t have much trouble cutting his human body out of the nape.”

Hanji stares at Zeke for a few moments, though their eyes remained sharply on the struggling titan.

“And if you’re wrong?” they say cautiously, tone suggesting that the two of them have discussed this before. “What if there isn’t a human body for you to pull out?”

“Then I will kill my only brother, and I alone will be responsible for that.”

* * *

So much happens that you’re barely able to follow the scene before you. The man is approaching Eren and speaking something, and then all of a sudden the titan is going utterly berserk. You can’t even imagine the exchange before Eren makes a sharp, loud screech that echoes painfully through the air. Your blood suddenly feels cold upon the recognition of the sound; it’s a noise of pain.

There’s not a single piece of you that cares enough to question what happens after the fact, the sight of a second figure joining the man or how they seem to converse. All your mind takes in and keeps is the knowledge that Eren is _hurt_ , he’s restrained and pinned to the ground in such a visceral way that makes your own body ache in agony for him.

There’s little to be done with the restraints around your wrists, but your legs work all the same to try and push you up and force yourself past the two garrison soldiers guarding you. It works for all of a few seconds before you feel the hard weight of one tackling against your back and sending you rolling back towards the ground in a painful heap. Despite all the struggling your tired body can offer, it doesn’t amount to much - you look up with tears thick and hot in your eyes to find this unknown man standing on Eren’s back, between his shoulder blades and -

No.

_**NO!** _

Your body shakes and struggles beneath the weight of one of the guards, so much that it actually loosens the knot of the gag against your tongue; the first scream of agony leaves your parted lips in the same moment that the bastard’s blade touches Eren’s nape.

“Stop!” you can barely register the fact that there is and are words behind the thick veil of horror in your voice. “Don’t you fucking touch him! He’s done nothing wrong! Don’t hurt-”

Whatever might follow is muffled again as the soldier above you wraps the cloth around your head and between your teeth. But even then, the muted sounds vibrate uselessly into the gag. Tears stream down the curves of your dirty-covered cheeks as you are practically forced to watch the man cut into Eren’s vital spot with several deep, toying motions that make your entire body shake with as much anger as grief.

But he continues to cut. And cut. You feel rage well into your belly at the assumption he’s doing it in something of ignorant revenge against a seemingly feral titan. Worse yet, you wonder if the man is doing it specifically as a form of torture, though your heart absolutely shatters when steam starts to emanate from Eren’s skin. Slowly, but fast enough for you to watch it happen, the titan’s form begins to wither away; first skin, then muscle, and then even bone, all washing into the air until there is not a single trace left to the earth.

You cry. And sob. And wail uselessly into the gag. There’s such a sense of cold grief that you can’t begin to understand how your heart isn’t physically breaking into pieces - it feels like it is.

And despite all of the emotions of ice and longing and misery that whirl within your body, somehow you still find the strength to lift your eyes and catch the last moments that you’d ever see Eren again in any form, only -

There is something else. Moreover, there is _someone_ else standing upon the titan’s steaming neck. The blonde man himself, but… You blink and stare, brows furrowed and grief momentarily numbed as confusion takes up every inch of your thoughts instead. The man is pulling… someone? Pulling them from… out of Eren’s nape?

The sight seems to make no sense to you, but you watch with widening eyes as realization slowly seeps into your ice-cold bones, especially when your eyes lay upon the face of the man being all but carved out from the titan’s body, with muscles and sinew detaching from naked shoulders, hips, arms and legs.

The face. There’s no doubting it for even a moment.

It’s… Eren?

* * *

“You’re looking worse for wear,” Zeke murmurs, eyes glancing down at his brother’s gaunt form. “But I guess it’s hard for a human body to live off sunlight alone.”

It was hard enough to cut just right into the hot flesh of the titan’s nape - too narrow would risk puncturing vital organs, and too wide would miss the connector muscles and do nothing at all but prolong the tension. It took longer than Zeke would have liked, but he couldn’t assume that Eren’s body would regenerate if he tried to save time by slicing through arms and legs. In fact, he and Hanji have been working off of a lot of assumptions since he heard the first reports of a very strange and seemingly intelligent abnormal titan roaming outside Wall Rose.

At least some of his risks are paying off.

Zeke is able to carry Eren with relative ease down onto the ground, which in itself is something worrisome. There are other scouts waiting for him at least, having already been briefed on what might happen if everything went to plan. They had first-aid supplies in-hand, but otherwise had a cart pulled around in order to transport Eren to a hospital farther in Wall Rose. Hanji is standing among them, though their attention is turned back towards where the other garrison soldiers were yet standing - one laying upon the seized companion of the titan who, with the look in their eyes and the tears falling visibly in thick rivers down their cheeks, seemed utterly shocked at sight of Eren’s human body.

“They deserve to know everything,” Hanji murmurs to Zeke, only briefly moving their gaze to make sure that Eren is secured properly in the cart for transport. “I don’t need clearance from Erwin to be sure of that much.”

They take in a slow breath, mind rolling over the numerous and exhausting events of the day, events that would take months, if not years, for people to fully recover from. As their eyes turn up towards the sky, Hanji can’t help but note the sight of birds soaring high above the walls. A group of ducks in migration, probably.

“I know,” he says, nodding for the other scouts to start moving Eren - he can stand to wait a few more hours for a proper reunion, if only to make sure Eren was in proper care first. “I saw the look in their eyes, it’s-”

“Love,” Hanji finishes.

They can’t help but notice the flock is moving outward, beyond Wall Rose. It’s been a while since they’d seen the animals migrate so far out - but maybe it’s a good sign for once.

Yeah, it’s a good sign.


	13. Little Soldier Mine

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> _Anonymous ask on tumblr: You said that human Eren becomes more clingy and protective of the reader. So what happens when he gets jealous?_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> As with many things, I didn't intend this to be more than a brief answer to someone's question on my [tumblr blog](https://attackontitanwritings.tumblr.com/). That said, I'm quite tickled with how this came out since I'm hardly shy in my love for a protective, feral man UvU

You’re in a room; it’s so dark that you wouldn’t even be able to see a hand just in front of your eyes. Though you feel chilled, the air itself has almost no feeling at all, a perfect ambience around you - even though there’s a sensation of ice constantly inching through your very bones.

There is silence all around you. Not a creek, a shuffle, or even the sound of your own heartbeat. Utter quiet to the point that it’s concerning, until you have to wonder if the lack of noise in itself is something to be more afraid of than any mysterious noise emanating from the darkness.

As you turn your blind gaze around you finally see it: eyes, hovering, sharp as a knife and glowing bright with the color of springtime grass and concentrated loathing. They are the gaze of a beast in the middle of a hunt; though you can’t see the body of which they belong to, there is a sense of enormous weight and power lying deep in their pools of focus that freeze you ever more than even the harshest winter wind.

These eyes are watching you. _Hunting_ you. Hating you.

And they’re crave blood.

...

Compacted into a single moment of time, it is the emotion found behind the eyes of the man watching you from just a few meters away. He hasn’t taken his gaze from you for even a single moment, as if acutely aware of every word that leaves your lips, every motion of your hand, and every inch closer you grow to _them_.

Them. You find it hard to focus on the person standing in front of you, the very person you originally had every intention to seduce under the presumption that they were single and alone. You’ve heard their name a time or two before - once a garrison member of Quinta, and now a prevalent soldier of the scouts - but you gave little heed to the warning of their protector always prowling close.

Their lover.

You decided it was silly rumor and thensome. A titan-turned-human? Far more mundane things have turned out to be children’s lies and sold by a beggar for little more than a copper piece. All you cared about was that the soldier before you seemed cute, seemed lonely, seemed... well, perhaps you can’t deny the little flash of fear in their eyes seemed a little appealing. But that would prove to be your second mistake.

The first was trying to seduce them in the first place.

* * *

“I... appreciate your offer,” you press a hand out to push the man away, trying not to be overt but neither appreciating how close he’s gotten to you since he all but backed you against the wall. “-but I’m afraid I’m not interested, nor am I available for uh... that kind of relationship.”

“Oh, come on,” he purrs, taking yet _another_ step closer within your bubble, undeterred by the force of your hand or the growing sternness in your eyes. “I think you need someone nice to show you around this town properly.”

Your brows furrow and you shove at his chest again; this time, he is forced to take a step away from you. Anger starts to boil in your chest.

“I’m not going to tell you a second time,” you growl slowly, watching the man’s mouth open to say something-

But he doesn’t. Instead, his eyes glance off to the side to something unknown and he immediately goes still. You’re close enough - unfortunately - to see the visible change in his expression from self-assured to surprise and then, in a heartbeat, to horror. The man stares at the unknown force for several moments before you grow curious yourself and turn to look at what seems to put so much fear into his eyes.

Eren, standing at the corner of the building turning onto the busy market streets. He’s holding a basket filled with various colors of vegetables and fruits that the two of you will later cook with dinner and thensome.

He stares at the man who has all but corralled you back against a wall, though his own expression seems empty and cold; only Eren’s eyes seem to glimmer with the faintest streaks of sunlight filtering into the alley from overtop the roofs above. After a few moments, the shifter tilts his head curiously to the side. He seems not to notice how some of his long, dark hair falls from over his eyes like a shroud, though the gesture is plenty enough to make the unfamiliar and offending man in front of you twitch back.

Eren needs only to take a single step forward before the same man is scrambling away from you, words of apology quick and blended together before he is finally turning down the next corner and back into the next street of bustling crowds. You watch him leave with a satisfied purse of your lips and pull of your brows. Whatever it was that he saw in Eren’s eyes in that single moment of time, it did well enough to scare the soul right out of him.

By the time you’ve turned back around to look at your lover, Eren is already at your side and leaning his face close to you.

“Hurt you?” he murmurs gently.

“No,” you answer in kind, reaching a hand up to pat assuringly at Eren’s shoulder. “But I was a couple seconds away from hurting him if he kept up with that nonsense.”

Eren seems amused by the answer. He purrs and rubs his face into the curve of your throat before gesturing with the basket in his hands.

“...bought things like you asked. These good?”

You peer at the variety of items, noting the quality in the tomatoes, peppers and even several well-sized potatoes that would make for a very hearty stew (something that Eren seemed especially fond of you making). As far as you could tell, it was a fine assortment of items from a perfectly good trip to the market - even moreso when considering that this is yet a new experience for Eren, only recently being comfortable to travel among crowds of people and deal with the general bustle of midday trading.

You reward the man with a gentle peck on the cheek and feel the skin grow flushed against your lips.

“These are perfect. I think we can probably head home now.”

Eren hums and carefully links an arm with you, being especially sure to keep you close beside him as you walk together back towards the main road.

“Good,” his eyes glance about the crowd. “I don’t like how they look at you.”

“And apparently they hate however it is you look at _them_ ,” you tease back, then let yourself lean into Eren’s body. “I don’t know what they see but boy, do they run _quick_.”

“Probably see a scary monster.” Eren makes a low noise of thought before adding, “They’re not entirely wrong.”

You roll your eyes at his words, factual instead of depreciating but nonetheless something he’s mused about multiple times before. Though Eren’s spent plenty of months yet as a human, it’s still obvious he doesn’t feel all that at home in his own body. It’s not hard for some people to be made uneasy around him either, especially those that did not already understand his history or background as much of the scouting regiment does. Though, if you were to try and describe how Eren holds himself, you’d be hard-pressed to deny how comfortable he is with being _different_. Happy even.

But then again, both of you were pretty strange people. 

“Well you’re _my_ scary monster,” You sigh dramatically and push yourself even harder against Eren’s body. “And not a soul within or outside these walls is going to change the fact that I love you.”

A moment passes, and he suddenly presses back against you. You’re nearly caught off-guard by the strength in his motion, but manage to keep yourself upright with your grip around his arm. He started purring somewhere within the motion, the noise so loud that he practically vibrates against you.

Eren leans his face, so that his lips brush ever so against the shell of your ear.

“And you’re mine alone, little soldier.”


	14. Breeding Confusion [2/2] [NSFW]

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Eren has been avoiding you. You think he might be angry, though you have no idea why, so you ask for some advice from Hanji and Levi to figure out why the man who is otherwise always glued to your side has suddenly started to distance himself.
> 
> As it turns out, the truth is far simpler (and obvious) than you could have ever imagined.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This is the follow up to [this chapter](https://archiveofourown.org/works/28830591/chapters/71593857), though honestly there's no context outside of a joke that's needed to fully enjoy this beast of a fic.
> 
> I honestly never thought this chapter would get so long, but it's definitely one of my proudest works in terms of description and pacing, not to mention of course the sex itself which also came out pretty damn good. I hope you guys enjoy it just as much - because there can never be enough horny feral Eren content in the world UvU

Several days pass from your visit with Hanji and Levi. Though life seems to shuffle on without any change, your mind can’t help but linger on the helpful advice that both veteran scouts had offered. It does nothing to change the fact that Eren continues to avoid you, always scurrying out of a room mere moments before you enter, but it does help to give you a sense of perspective in things.

In all, you’re simply grateful that he isn’t harboring some sort of loathing towards you, enigmatic or otherwise.

Still, you can’t fathom how you ever thought the look in his eyes was anger. There is a great passion within them in the rare moments your gazes might meet, yes, but after spending so long beside the man and titan alike, how could you have misunderstood it? Perhaps anxiety, perhaps self-doubt-

Perhaps a lot of things played into it.

Though you don’t often talk about it, the shift to living among the scouts was and continues to be as challenging for yourself as it is for Eren. Like a dream, simply waking up to the sound of other people bustling about their day feels as surreal as flying among the clouds or drifting through the endless abyss of the night sky. Years of ingrained survival doesn’t simply go away in a matter of weeks, not even months - and it’s not as if you can ignore how your mind immediately starts to consider secondary uses of almost anything you encounter, having relied almost exclusively on your wit and creativity to work through more than a couple challenges in the past that might have left you cold, hungry or outright dead. Old clothes make for good bandages, if washed correctly. Wood can be reused into shelter pieces, and even bits of metal can be recycled into fishing hooks and bobbers.

But you know what’s going on in Eren’s head again, one way or another, and that is a relief like nothing else. Problems could pile heavy and high above the clouds, but knowing that you didn’t in fact do something to ruin the relationship with your closest companion makes it all seem like they weigh nothing at all.

A matter of  _ how _ you were going to speak to the man, or even so much as get in a room alone with him, however, is another predicament entirely. Intentions hardly matter when Eren was and  _ is _ avoiding you.

Perhaps Levi had the right of things. Though you know it isn’t quite as simple as stripping off all your clothes and bidding the titan shifter to come fuck you into next week, it’s not as if Eren hadn’t been so blunt or brazen with his lust on previous occasions. You can recall an easy stream of encounters where, even as a titan, Eren was more than content to distract and bother you from larger projects like an oversized dog hell-bent on having his affections announced - though he certainly wanted more than a head scratch behind the ears. And thensome.

What you decide ultimately is to wait. Even though he could keep a distance from you during the day-to-day happenings of the scouts, Eren still returned home to you every night, albeit far past when you’ve fallen asleep. Like clockwork, always when you’ve drifted off and gone just before you’ve woken up, bed still warm and covers recently tossed aside as if he knew precisely when you’d be awake.

And you’re not quite sure if that fact more annoyed or bothered you.

So, it is on this evening that you wait for him with a fervent plan in mind and a dedication to see it through, even if it meant wrestling with Eren like a feral cat in heat - and that might not be a far cry from the truth, all things considered.

You sit at the dining table, head down over your crossed arms, staring out towards the front door. The sunset fills the sky beyond the glass panes with a gentle golden glow. This is normally the time he’d be coming home, sometimes with you beside him if training had the two of you cycling through partnered drills. You have dinner simmering on the stove and that at least distracts your mind from entirely focusing on the door itself or the silence beyond it. Nothing fancy, but a hearty stew all the same - Eren had been allotted extra rations of meat due to his special predicament, and you are never shy in finding all manners of ways to put them to use.

Thoughts begin to muffle and drift after a while, but a noise suddenly jolts you to focus. A rummaging at the front door, though you can’t see anyone standing outside of it. Surprise turns to confusion, then to caution, as you rise from the chair and step slowly towards it, watching the door shake against something unseen outside. A reach towards the door handle leaves your mind as still as it is racing, but when you turn the knob and pull it open it’s not the form of Eren nor a hungry beast standing outside, but a cat.

It’s bright, hazel eyes stare up at you for a moment before greeting you with a meow.

“You’re not who I was expecting,” you sigh, relieved for the most part. “Well, you’ve already given me a heart attack so get your furry little butt inside.”

The feline pauses for a few moments before stepping around and pressing it’s soft body against your legs in a show of affection. After that, your eyes glance up and scan the space in front of the door, up the dirt path leading towards the road and onward.. There’s not a second or even third pair of eyes staring back at you, which is almost as surprising as it is relieving with all things considered.

Muffin - the cat you’ve just let inside - is just one of many pets that have been merged into the household as one occasional stray after another showed up repeatedly at your doorstep for any scraps you had to offer. And even Eren came home on occasion with a scruffy kitten in his arms or a clingy tomcat hanging off his shoulder, much to your amusement and befuddlement alike.

He always had an odd connection with animals, even as a titan. Always gentle, always careful, as if able to connect to them on a level you can’t quite understand.

You sigh and close the door without another thought, half-hoping that Eren might have been coming over the horizon where the dirt trail sloped down the hill to the main road. 

Enigmatic, that man is. Somehow slipping into bed just as you’re drifting off and already out the door by the moment you’re waking up. And for what - lust? Is he truly  _ that _ afraid of hurting you? Despite the fact that he’s able to speak rather fluently on his better days, Eren has never been quite so distant and unreadable - and never for  _ this _ long. 

When you turn to face the kitchen and dining room proper, Muffin greets you from atop one of the counters, her face tilted to the side and tail lightly flicking out behind her. It doesn’t take a genius to know she’s keen on getting an early dinner, likely drawn to the house by the smell of the simmer stew, and you don’t have the heart to deny such a face as hers. She’s one of the more unique strays that have wiggled their way into your hearts and home alike, and one of the first that Eren had brought home. Her coat was long and thick, colored with across her back with patches of black and ginger-red while her underbelly a crisp snowy white; she always comes across with the personality of a princess, constantly grooming herself to the point that you like to pretend she’s trying to get the attention of all the toms wandering around the house.

“I might have something for you,” you murmur with a half-smile. “But you have to promise you won’t let the others know I twisted the rules for you or else we’ll have a dozen furballs pawing at the door.”

Muffin stares at you for a moment before meowing and reaching up a paw to lick at and rub over her face.

“Good to know we’re in agreement.”

She continued to groom and lounge several paces from you on the counter while you silently cooked one of the eggs nestled in the nearby basket from the last trip to the market. You had contemplated giving her a few pieces of stew meat, but decided instead to keep as much of it for you and Eren as possible, knowing he’d likely be starving after a whole day of training; whenever he decided to come home, that is.

You piled the scrambled egg onto a small platter and offered it to the cat, who accepted the food eagerly with rushed mouthfuls and several grateful half-meows. It brings a smile to your lips, but thoughts continue to gnaw at the back of your mind when your eyes glance towards the door again. The sun’s starting to fall below the horizon while the sky is losing its color rapidly and fading into a dull, dark abyss of night. 

The suspicion that Eren is waiting for you to be asleep to return home is not lost among your concerns, though you’d not yet given it a proper test to know for certain his timing is wholly intentional.

But tonight you decide to do just that.

For a few moments you think to simply leave the pot of stew out and pretend to go to sleep early. Though it would be easier for you not to dwell on the details of theatrics, you don’t want to risk tipping Eren off in any particular way. After all he is akin to a flightful animal right now, ready to run at the smallest indication that you’re aware of what he’s doing. 

So you go through the motions of waiting (and  _ waiting _ ) as you’ve genuinely done for the past week. Upon ‘accepting’ the fact that he’s not going to be home for a while you take the effort to go through your nightly ritual, and even lay some extra food out for the other cats who lingered about in the woods near the house.

And then -  _ only  _ then - you allow yourself to put the stew away after having a bowl for yourself, ruminating over what you’ll do exactly after getting Eren alone in a room with you for more than a moment.

Fuck him, probably. 

Though to be more accurate, it’s more likely the positions would be switched around instead; not that you’re complaining about it. The realization lingers even in the farthest reaches of your thoughts, so coy and subtle that you naturally want to explore them further. How might it feel? The way his fingertips caress your skin or how his teeth might sink possessively into your shoulder.

To say you’re vaguely aroused by the line of thoughts is quite the understatement, and one you’ve been dealing with ever since speaking to the two veteran Scouts.

Still, you can understand in some regard why Eren is so apprehensive about it. You’ve seen firsthand what kind of violence he’s capable of without restraint, the kinds of injuries he can inflict despite being but 6 feet tall instead of 50. It’s not something that’s happened a lot - only a few times in fact - but it’s enough to color the situation in a subtle shade of caution. You wonder why Eren hadn’t at least brought it up to you once it became an issue.

He’s always been a man of actions over words though, so at least he’s consistent about his response one way or another. No different than any other challenge the two of you have overcome. It’s just one more bump in the road, even if this bump is a bit more embarrassing to discuss with others - it’s hard enough to admit to yourself as much, but the two of you are already something of an odd couple.

Everything is so quiet when you finally reach the bedroom. It’s hard to think that the world itself isn’t falling asleep with how peaceful the air feels, with just the slightest chill pushing you ever quicker to the comfort of the bed and the warmth of the blankets. You have absolutely no intention of falling asleep one way or another. Regardless of that, you can’t deny how good the embrace of a soft bed feels after a long day.

Especially since today - tonight, rather - isn’t quite over yet.

You lay on your side in dark silence, bedroom cast in a soft shadow that beckons you so sweetly into the embrace of slumber, but a combination of stubborn willpower and vague loneliness does well enough to fight it back. It isn’t until you shift your body ever so slightly that you’re reminded the emptiness of the other side; a sense of longing fills your chest, having not realized the depth of your missing Eren's presence beside you.

A week isn’t a terribly long time for most people. But when you’ve spent every day with your beloved person for the last many years, however, the stark contrast of the empty air without their presence is certainly nothing to ignore. Eren is no exception, especially since he’s the reason you survived for all those years; love came not as a necessity for survival, but as a miracle despite it. The two of you have battled together, lived together, and have nearly died together on more occasions than you can count on both hands.

And  _ this _ is what puts the two of you at odds?

Air escapes over your lips in a warm sigh, and your mind starts to feel calmer with the exhale. Thoughts of today’s happenings wind down neatly in your mind, as if they’re being properly filled away for any future use requiring the memories. But even as the minutes tick by and the moonlight starts to filter through the open window, you are awake, alert and most especially… bored. There’s simply no telling when Eren might choose to sneak into bed, so you can’t afford to indulge in sleep for even a minute - and nor can you do anything that might tip the man off. Eventually you begin to count the stars visible from where you lay in bed. You number one after another in a slow, monotonous stream.

_ One… two… three… _

Many of them are dim and small beyond the glass, so you’re sure that there’s plenty of duplicates counted among the group. It does well enough regardless to distract you from the sweet cloying warmth of sleep.

_ Twenty-five… twenty-six… twenty-seven… _

But soon even that isn’t enough to pull your mind away from the sense of worry. Anxiety. The question that, even when you manage to confront Eren, what will happen then? What will you do to him?

Or rather, what will he do to  _ you _ ?

_ Forty-nine… fifty… fifty-one… _

Try as you might to focus, the numbers start to waver and wane behind your eyelids until you soon lose count altogether. The frustration makes you over and splay across the open bed. But even then you can’t stop the curiosity from sinking its claws deep into your brain.

What would it be like if Eren were to walk in right now?

He might approach the bed from the shadows of the doorway with eyes gleaming out from beneath the messy curtain of his long, dark hair. A monster prowling amidst the darkness to slip into your bed unseen and unheard. And would he look at you like before, with fire blazing in his gaze so hot that it threatened to burn you up? Gaze as sharp as a knife, like a predator moments before pouncing upon its witless prey.

You selfishly allow the thought to play onward, eyes closing tight to make it feel more vivid in your mind’s eye. With each fragment of thought, your heartbeat starts to quicken and thump loudly within your chest.

Yes, he would approach the bed with that hungry look in his eyes. It’s ironic how such an expression makes you feel small and weak but so safe in the very same moment - it’s the exact look he’d given you in all previous moments of intimacy together as titan and human. And back then, he seemed content enough to smother you with attention in so many forms that merely recalling the memories alight your cheeks with fire.

So what would he be now?

Eren would be  _ relentless _ . For all the weight that he can carry on his shoulders, there is always a breaking point. You’ve experienced this firsthand in various situations - some more fearful than others. The creature capable of snapping trees and ripping titans limb from limb is the same one who is able to make stars burst behind your eyelids and your body quiver with euphoria upon his tongue. 

For some reason that fact alone is exhilarating. Fear and arousal have always been close partners since meeting Eren, emotions so different yet dancing in a delicate balance you’d never would have guessed is possible.

But despite everything, you trust him. Upon months of shared experiences and challenges alike, Eren was able to understand and comfort you even in the most vulnerable of moments. You like to think that you understood him too, but now you have to wonder if there’s something secret that Eren has yet to allow you to see of him. A side of his soul that, for whatever reason, he’s chosen to hide.

You’ll simply have to build that trust anew.

Somewhere in your vibrant thoughts, the specter of Eren looks down at you, eyes striking and green like spring leaves beneath the glow of a full moon. A shiver rolls down your spine. You imagine that his lips are curled ever so slightly, amusement coloring his expression upon finding you like this; your body wide and aching for his touch.

“Eren…” you can’t help but whisper his name. Longing and lonely.

The imagined vision of your lover tilts his head to the side, ears flicking in amusement just as he would as a titan.

“Desperate,” he growls, in fact more than question - accusing you of the emotions that twist in the pit of your stomach.

You want nothing more than to feel his hands on your skin, but not even your fevered thoughts can conjure such a sensation from nothing. Instead, you imagine the man stepping around to the foot of the bed and leaning against it enough so he can peer down at you.

Sharp teeth glimmers past the man’s sharper grin. “Touch yourself,” he murmurs. “Let me see.”

Some small part of you wonders if Eren would actually have the self-restraint to say something like that, but you can hardly bring yourself to care when the rest of your body is fully immersed in the fantasy. You take in a shuddering breath and let one of your hands hover at your chest while the other slowly roams down the front of your body. Since you expected not to need many layers for the evening all you wore was a long night shirt, and even that felt too thin beneath the gaze of a man who could all but rip it off you if he so desired.

You know this from  _ experience _ , even if that previous experience came from underestimating how much an excited titan like Eren wanted to get you out of your clothes.

The tips of your fingers skim delicately over the buttons holding the shirt closed.

“No,” Eren growls suddenly, though your hand stops moving a fraction of a moment before the imagined word leaves his lips. “Unbutton your shirt.”

Heat fills your cheeks despite the fact that you’re the one in control of the fantasy. Even imagined, the sound of Eren’s low voice makes your stomach twist in desire as something both familiar and not at the same time. You want to hear it in your ear, growling and groaning with words so dirty that you can scarcely let your mind imagine them. But you nevertheless comply with the silent command. Shaking fingers slip down and undo each button until, at last, it falls open to reveal the entirety of your bare body beneath the soft moonlight streaming in from the open window.

“Beautiful,” the imagined Eren murmurs slowly. “So beautiful and  _ mine _ .”

Your eyes flutter open for a moment in surprise at how your brain so smoothly replicated his words. A glance towards the empty space at the front of the bed reveals nobody there - but your body looks so bare beneath the soft light of the moon filtering through the window. The air feels chilled against bare skin, and it serves to anchor you as much in the moment as it does to help you feel loosened from it.

Fire burns across your face and you shut your eyes once more before trying to conjure the vision again. Of Eren’s burning gaze and mischievous smile that makes your heart leap. It comes to color and clarity by the time you have a hand moving down the front of your body and hissing at how the simple touch makes you  _ crave _ more. More of Eren. More of his words, his eyes, his attention, his  _ everything _ .

You want to be  _ his _ .

“And you already are,” he murmurs upon somehow reading your thoughts - fantasy and all that it is. “Mine. Mine.  _ You’re mine.” _

There is something about the notion of being claimed that makes your fingertips explore further down your hips, pace and pressure leaving your body on the precipice of ‘too much’ and ‘not enough’. It leaves your heart racing, not sure if the goal is to bring yourself to a quick climax or attempt to delay it for as long as possible.

“Eh-” you can barely sputter out even the man’s name as your body trembles with your own feverish touch. “Er-eh-…” Cold air sweeps over your lips with a sharp breath. “Eren-… Please touch m-me…”

There’s a distant creek elsewhere in the house.

The imagined specter of Eren continues to look down at you with half-lidded eyes, ones which make you feel so tiny and safe beneath him - a fragile human under the gaze of someone perfectly capable of destroying an entire army if they so much as meant to do you harm. 

Someone who loves you like the stars love the moon in the abyss of the night sky.

“Not yet,” Eren murmurs softly. “I want to see you get worked up first. Show me how much you want it.”

You’re not sure how much of his conjured dialogue is your own fantasy or what you legitimately think he might say, but it matters for so little when your brain is a complete mess of heat and pleasure. You can feel a sense of tension and climax trickling somewhere deep in your belly as fingertips rub and press over sensitive flesh.

Somewhere muffled in the back of your mind you remember that it might not be a particularly good idea to get yourself so worked up. But that thought is quiet and weak when set against the backdrop of such burning euphoria in your veins, as if instinct alone is what’s driving you to keep your hand moving, your hips shaking, and your mind yet conjuring up a hazy vision of the lover you had every plan to seduce into bed later on.

Another creak echoes from the kitchen, though it doesn’t take more than a heartbeat for your mind to instantly provide an image of a cat as the obvious perpetrator.

And that distracts you somewhat. The noise. Enough that you finally have to accept the fact that orgasming here and now would likely do more harm than good in the long run, even if you did yearn with every fiber of your being to milk yourself dry of pleasure; how long has it been since the last time you’d touched yourself let alone the last time Eren had been with you. A month? Two perhaps?

A frustrated sigh passes over your lips when cold air brushes against your skin, hand drawing back in something of half-defeat.

But only half. Even if you  _ couldn’t _ get yourself off, there is at least another option to keep you occupied - one that would at minimum be productive, given that you still aren’t sure how patient Eren might be when he’d step into the bedroom, if he ever does tonight. Even if you end up picking the wrong evening to wait, or if he’d somehow known you were planning this, you could at least enjoy the heat of your own fantasies and the rough touch of your own fingers sliding inside of you.

The bedsheets tangle around your limbs when you turn and reach for the small table just off the side. Fingers fumble for a few moments before hooking onto the knob of the top drawer, and quickly it opens with a sharp motion to reach an item that you’d hidden inside just a few hours ago.

Oil is something of a precious commodity within the walls, even so before the fall of Wall Maria. It takes a lot of land and manpower to produce something of quality, and even moreso when the intent is for the body rather than for food. As you wrap your fingers around the small bottle and pull it back towards you on the bed, the memory of its purchase surfaces for only a moment. An impulse, really, one that you hadn’t given much thought when buying it at the market. While you never imagined that your first time with Eren as a human would be like this, the oil was purchased with the intention of use for sex regardless. 

Heat infuses into your belly and chest as you look the bottle over.

Penetration had never been a topic of consideration until now. Truth be told, you’d gotten quite used to experiencing intimacy with Eren in other ways due to the  _ slight _ size difference - as much as it can be described as ‘slight’ when most of your relationship was with him standing some 15 meters tall. But this is new territory for you as much as it is for him. There’s a certain amount of nervous excitement at the thought of him being able to make love to you as any other human couple.

Would he be rough? Gentle? Would he tease you? Would he  _ fuck _ you? Make love to you?

And despite all the questions already rolling around your brain, one stuck out so clearly that it alone almost makes your stomach twist in carnal curiosity: how… big is he? Girthy? Long? Would you be able to take him with minimal prep, or is it wise for you to have such forethought in the first place?

So many questions and so few answers, not that you have the patience or mind to answer them anyway. You pour a generous amount of cold oil over your index and middle finger and watch it slowly drip down the length of them. It shimmers slightly in the moonlight, glossy and slick-feeling even before you tentatively rub your thumb against your fingers to cover them more evenly.

After a few moments you lay back over the bed, sheets and pillows vaguely askew around your body as your hand slowly hovers down the center of your chest, belly and finally between your open and shaking thighs.

There’s a part of you that wants nothing more than to be slow and gentle, to explore your body in a way you haven’t been able to for longer than you can remember. And you are, at least at first; your slick fingertips caress between your thighs until you feel yourself gently prod the tight muscles of your entrance. Nervousness makes you freeze for a moment.

Did you hear another creak? With how loud your heartbeat is in your ears, it’s really hard to tell what noise is coming from the house and what is coming from your own mind. You decide to ignore it regardless before carefully pressing the length of your oil-slicked fingers against your entrance until the muscles slowly yield to the pressure. It’s… not painful, but there’s a certain sense of strangeness about it. It takes your body a few minutes to get used to the feeling of even your fingers opening yourself up but, slowly, the telltale tinge of pleasure begins to worm through your belly again.

Thoughts of Eren’s voice in your ear helps to fend off any lingering sense of doubt or nervousness. How he might growl against you, words deep and needy like he’s barely able to contain himself at the sight of you. Such thoughts grow more vivid with every motion of your fingers as they slip deeper, pads rubbing up along the tight heat and slowly milking out a sense of pleasure that overshadows everything else. You want  _ more _ . You want to feel  _ full _ .

“Eren-!”

The sound of your lover’s name drips from your lips like honey, thick and needy. Even your body can’t lay still at the desperate fantasy. You start to writhe and arch against the push of your fingers, and there’s not a moment of thought or care in your mind when all you want is Eren,  _ Eren _ ,  **_Eren_ ** -

You can remember all the times you’d felt this way with him before, typically settled warm and safe in the palm of one massive hand and his tongue wide and squirming between your thighs. How he’d let you wiggle, seeking release desperately while he purred so loud that you could feel it down the length of your spine. Such memories flash behind your closed eyelids as your mouth opens and your voice sobs out the sound of his name again, begging - no,  _ pleading _ \- for him to fuck you.

The last thing you expect, however, is to feel a firm grip around your wrist in physical reply.

Your eyes fly open and panic fills your veins like ice water. Your heart all but stops and your body, for all it had been shaking with need, suddenly siezes up with fear and surprise alike.

Above you, leaning over the side of the bed, is Eren. 

His eyes seem as if to glow a bright green in the shadows of the room, and you would think him just another figment of your rampant imagination if it isn’t for the fact that you aren’t trying to fantasize anymore and, more specifically, that his grip is tight around your wrist; the same one that has gone still between your legs. You can  _ feel _ how warm his fingers are against your skin. This is  _ no  _ fantasy, vivid or otherwise.

But when did he…?

“Heard you from the front door,” the man murmurs slowly. “Thought you’d be asleep by now. Guess not.”

His head tilts softly to the side in something that you think is idle curiosity. But as his hair falls away from his face, it reveals something in his eyes you’ve only recently come to interpret: lust. That burning fire deep within pools of emerald, barely restrained behind an expression of fake indifference. It sears into your body and soul alike, so hot that you can barely hold the man’s gaze without feeling as if burning up within it.

“You’ve been avoiding me.”

Somehow, the words fall so easily from your tongue - emboldened perhaps by the fire in your veins and the weight in your lower belly. They’re not an accusation per say, but you neither mean them to be soft. More of a statement of fact, the moment unfurling before you even have the chance to think it through. You had a plan of sorts, after all, but not for a moment did you account for Eren to simply waltz in while you were doing  _ this _ and stare at you as if he is a half-starved wolf eyeing up a juicy steak.

Eren stares at you for a few moments with a look of apparent apathy. It’s often difficult for people to read him, though it’s largely due to the fact that his expressions are subtle and hard to understand - he’s still not all that used to the muscles in his face, even if he’s gotten a fair hold on being verbal. Most emotions are expressed through his eyes.

And they are absolutely  _ burning  _ with desire.

Hungry and desperate, you feel a genuine shiver move down your spine, and you suddenly realize how utterly small it feels to be beneath him. Though Eren is very much human right now, there is no ignoring the beast hiding just within his shadow; the same beast that has ravished you as much as he’s protected you.

And now he yearns. He wants. He  _ craves. _

“I might hurt you,” is all he says at first, so confident in the words that it feels as if he’s assuring himself of the fact. “I  _ will  _ hurt you.”

“No you won’t,” you murmur gently in reply. Assuringly. So much that there’s a smile naturally tugging at the corners of your lips as you gaze up at him. “You didn’t hurt me once when you were a titan.”

“That’s different.”

You scoff, “No it isn’t. You’re still the same man I fell in love with - regardless of how scary you seem to think you are.”

Eren’s eyes narrow softly for a moment. You can see the thoughts twisting around his mind like raging stormwinds. Contemplating and cautious.

But he hasn’t released his tight grip from your wrist, leaving you in a growing predicament of nervous embarrassment in the fact that your fingers are still inside you.

But after a few moments, you curl your fingers deeper. The motion is obvious as your hand moves farther between your legs; you can only hope that your eyes appear to hold half as much steadfastness as Eren’s does on even his worst days.

“You can either watch me touch myself-” the words, though soft, somehow remain unbroken against the gentle pleasure skimming up your body or the scorching heat across your face. “-or you can be the one to ravish me. Take your pick, because I’m not waiting any longer.”

For all but a split-second of time from how the words fill the air, Eren’s expression shifts delicately from apathy to surprise, and then finally into something different altogether. It’s deeper, burning both of fire and desire that threatens to consume everything it touches. He tilts his head again and you can feel the weight of his gaze, focus as sharp as a knife but making you shiver with anticipation all the same.

After what feels like an eternity and a half, Eren finally closes his eyes. His dark hair hides away some of his face as he stands up again, unwrapping his fingers from your wrist and instead pulling his hands up to the center of his shirt; it takes a few moments for you to realize he is starting to unbutton it.

Your attention is pulled so entirely to the motion that you forget what you had been so intent upon doing not even a few minutes prior. There’s such a desperate ache to your body, but at the same time you cannot pull your eyes away from the sight so sensual as to watch Eren’s shirt fall off his shoulders and reveal the gentle curves and planes of a body you still haven’t quite mapped out.

Somewhere along the line you must have remembered to start thrusting eager fingers ever deeper within your tight, slick heat, because you don’t miss the way that Eren’s eyes roam openly up and down the length of your body as one might gaze upon a piece of fine art.

Or a beast staring down at its next meal.

“You smell so good,” he says at last, tone almost casual as his hands slip down to the belt of his pants and begin undoing the buckle. “Do you know that?”

“I-” the sound of your voice is swallowed all too suddenly by a sense of soft embarrassment. “-I haven’t… really thought about it.”

A flash of bright green settles heavy upon you, like hands pressing on your shoulders and hips.

“So  _ good _ ,” Eren continues. He pulls the end of his belt from the metal buckle, so slowly that you have to wonder after a few short breaths if it’s on purpose. “The weird thing is… it makes me feel so  _ hungry. _ Like I want to  _ devour _ you.”

Your eyes flick up towards Eren’s face just in time to see the flash of his sharp teeth - and the tip of his tongue tracing over their edges.

There’s suddenly an overwhelming feeling of familiarity in the emotion that sweeps through your body. You feel… small. Small and powerless; fragile even, despite the fact that he is very much a human and you are very much unable to fit in the center of his palm. But your mind simply doesn’t care about that. Instead, it reminds you of exactly how you felt the very first time you laid so bare and vulnerable within Eren’s warm hand, and how he had gazed down upon your naked body with eyes shameless with yearning.

He bares the very same look in his gaze now, and you feel just as small beneath him as you did then. Just as small, vulnerable, and most importantly: maddenly aroused.

One hand flies up to try and cover your mouth before a moan slips past your lips even as your other digits sink deeper in repeated motions between your thighs. After a few breaths, you whisper between shaking fingers, “I-is there a-anything else you… w-ant to do to me?”

Eren flashes another glint of sharp, dangerous teeth.

“Everything.”

There’s not even a moment to take in his single-word warning before Eren all but literally pounces upon you, clothes a forgotten heap on the floor and his body a heavy warmth upon you. With barely enough time to pull both of your hands back and up towards your face - more out of surprise than defense - you feel the man lay himself down as if wanting to smother you completely with his body.

“Eren-” the sound of his name goes mute when his mouth moves against the curve of your throat, lips parted so that the edges of his teeth can skim over sensitive skin.

“Makes me feel like I’m going crazy,” he growls, words vibrating and his hands pressing into the mattress beneath you to just barely hold him up. “The way you smell, the way you  _ sound _ . Every inch of you is absolutely maddening.”

He nips your throat hard enough to make you jump and a noise of surprise slips from your mouth - and it seems to satisfy Eren plenty. One of his hands reaches up to cup the back of your head, almost cradling it as he presses his face harder to the side of your neck.

And all you can do is writhe beneath him, hips pressing up to find that he is hard and aching.

“I want to breed you,” Eren finally says, his breath hot against your skin. “Make you round and heavy and  _ mine.” _

You blink and gasp, “But I can’t get-”

“I know,” Eren nips your throat to cut off the words. “Believe me, I know.”

He nips again at your skin just a little  _ harder _ . Then he presses his lips to the spot and kisses it - sucks on it even - with your nerves sensitive and spiraling despite the fact that he’s barely started to touch you. But you can  _ feel _ him and his cock, thick and firm and grinding down against you in such a messy eagerness that it’s hard to think any farther than the pleasure filling you up.

“I know,” he repeats the words with a tantalizing sense of danger in his tone. “And I don’t care. Wanna fuck you ‘till it doesn’t even matter anymore.”

Soon enough your head falls to the side in a silent, gentle submission. A growl slips up Eren’s throat and he takes the offer eagerly, pressing his teeth to your skin and parting his lips in a pleasure-pain motion that would undoubtedly leave a trail of discolored marks down the side of your throat by morning.

You’re squirming and squealing by the time he shifts himself back to look down at you properly. His half-lidded gaze is so full of emotions both familiar and new, but there’s not much to guess at when you can see the evidence standing tall at the center of his hips. Though you can’t claim to have seen a multitude of dicks across a multitude of lovers, your mind quickly catches onto the details which make your stomach twist and your body feel many shades hotter.

The length doesn’t intimidate you, but the girth certainly causes a brief spark of fear and delight in equal measure. Your own fingers barely compare to the thick cock standing erect before your eyes; you can’t deny the feeling of instinct tearing at the back of your mind to have it inside you  _ immediately _ .

Still, you don’t have the chance to get a word out before Eren growls a low, husky command.

“ _ Turn over _ .”

It takes a moment before you realize the weight of even those two simple words; it’s almost as heavy as Eren’s gaze peering down at you, like you’re little more than a cornered rabbit. You manage to shift with some sense of grace, slowly turning your body around until the sheets feel almost cool against your belly and chest.

Eren doesn’t hesitate to fall over you once more, though undeniably gentle in his motions. He presses himself along your back until his lips seem to instinctively find the nape of your neck. They part to reveal the sharpness of eager teeth and a warm, wet tongue which quickly starts sucking possessive marks against your skin.

“Something inside me wants to see you round,” the man growls against your skin between each sloppy kiss. “So fucking full of my cum that you  _ have _ to get pregnant.”

His hips start to shift and -  _ ah _ \- his cock grinds down against the curve of your ass with such a careless desperation that you want to push yourself back in silent permission for more. But it’s hard to move at all with how his body weight presses down upon you, equal in possession and power alike; it’s as if Eren doesn’t want you to move unless he alone wills it.

“You… you squirm so much,” he murmurs, nipping at your neck as if to prove a point when you wiggle beneath him in response. “But you’re so pretty when you do that. So… cute. So small. Fragile. And all mine.”

Eren’s voice has grown low and thick in the moments of budding intimacy, losing some of the detail in the consonants he once had such a hard time pronouncing. But even then, as rough as his voice gets, the eager darkness in the tone is enough to understand his burning lust. It’s as hot as how his eyes  _ feel _ against your body, pressing down so possessively you’re worried that it might suffocate you.

He rolls his body against yours, rutting hard against your ass until his cock starts to slide between your oil-slicked inner thighs. A delicate moan slips from between your lips and you can practically  _ feel _ how the noise affects him, his body positively shivering with excitement and delight.

“Mine,” he says against your neck, voice so low that eerily it reminds you of how he might sound as a titan. “Mine.  **_M...i...n...e…_ ** ”

This is what he’s been hiding from you. These feelings, this need, gently twisting him from stoic man to unrestrained beast desperately searching for what will soothe his searing instincts. He growls against the back of your neck before moving his hands into the mattress on either side of your torso, propping himself up just enough to shift his hips and-

“A-ah! Eren!” his name feels like burning honey on your lips. It’s so hot, but you yearn for the taste of it. “B-be careful, pl-please-“

The feeling of his cock pressed up against you is more than enough to knock the rest of the words right out of your chest. It took plenty of time and lubricant to loosen your muscles, but they don’t immediately yield as Eren pushes the head of his cock against your entrance. The man ruts his hips a few times as if to test the motion, and then he growls - but the sound is far from aggressive. It reminds you too much of the sound he’d make when you were moments away from orgasm, shaking like a leaf in his hand and feeling too twisted with pleasure to fabricate any sort of coherent thought.

“Mate,” he murmurs, nipping your nape once as if to get your attention. “Open up for me. Let me have you. Claim you. Mine.”

For a few moments you’re confused and almost afraid, waiting for the moment that Eren would force himself inside you in some haze of need, but he doesn’t. He merely continues to coo and murmur against your skin in half-broken sentences, eventually working his lips up to the shell of one of your ears and nibbling at it gently. All the while he grinds his body against you, just hard enough to feel the tip of his aching shaft rub tantalizingly against your entrance, but not hard enough to push or force himself inside.

He’s waiting, you quickly realize. For a response. 

Your permission.

A bonfire of heat surges through your body at this odd gesture of intimacy, even as Eren barely has enough sense to speak at all. He nips again at the shell of your ear; you can’t help the sweet moan which slips off the tongue with your answer to him:

“Please-“ your toes practically curl with anticipation. “fill me up. Fuck me. Mate.”

Eren offers only a low, drawn out purr as a reply. He nuzzles the back of your head before you feel his hips shift and his legs adjust behind himself. The bed dips beneath his weight and yours alike as he moves, one hand of his moving to the small of your back and pressing down firmly, but carefully until your body has to move with his motion. Your ass tilts up against his hips instinctively with the pressure, but it takes you a moment to realize exactly how Eren’s moving his body to slot against your own-

As if he’s mounting you.

The mere realization of it makes your heartbeat skip. You arch your body even further against the man, vaguely wondering what it must look like to have him atop you in such a way. Like a beast, a monster, the same titanous creature who is as willing to leave you safe and secure as he is to leave you shaking and desperate with only his name dripping from your tongue.

Eren’s hips finally push forward in the span of a single breath, with just enough force that you feel yourself slowly open up around the unfamiliar shape of his cock. He slides inside your body’s hot grip in one slow but powerful motion, leaving you shaking with sensations you’re not quite sure at first how to filter through.

It doesn’t hurt, but you immediately feel a sense of vague discomfort - it’s like you’re being stretched open just a  _ little _ too much. As if your muscles aren’t sure how to accommodate the heavy shape yet pressing inside you. Instinct makes your body wiggle and squirm to try and find a position that dulls the odd feeling soaking through your belly, but Eren growls in quick reply,

“No. Be still.”

The words are far from annoyed or angry, but the tone itself is still very firm, giving you only a moment of warning before the sensation of sharp teeth pressing into the flesh of your nape takes up every inch of your focus. He doesn’t break the skin or draw blood, but the pleasure-pain of Eren using the grip of his teeth to hold you down against the bed is more than enough to help forget how big he is inside you. How he continues to slide, inch after inch, as your muscles slowly grow accustomed to the generous girth within you.

The man purrs even with your skin between his teeth. He purrs so loudly that you can feel it vibrating in the back of your head and even down your spine - you can almost feel it throughout your entire body, much like how you could feel it when he was in a form far larger, but no less desperate to have you writhing under his touch.

“Good,” Eren murmurs after a moment, words vaguely muffled against your skin. “A perfect mate. So good, I’ll make you feel so good.” 

You’re a little too dazed to realize exactly why he’s offering you praise before he moves his hips and -  **_oh_ ** \- he is entirely sheathed within you. Tip to base, every inch of his cock feels hot, heavy and endlessly satisfying. But the man hardly gives you the time to enjoy the sensation alone. Once Eren seems certain that you are comfortable he starts to move with sharp, rhythmic thrusts of his hips.

How someone can be so rough and yet so gentle, you’ll never know. The grip of Eren’s teeth finally unlatches from the back of your neck when a small cry leaves your throat, likely assuming it to be a sound of pain. You scramble to reach a hand behind your shoulders and grab a fistful of his hair, holding tight when soft locks fall between your fingers. A growl of your own vibrates in your throat, you pull his face back down towards your neck and turn even your face to the side to try and catch the man’s eyes.

“N-no,” you murmur, each syllable broken with each thrust of eager hips. “B-bite me again. Don’t-...be scared of hurting me. F-feels...goo-...good!”

Eren’s breath is hot against your abused skin. Though you’re certain that there will be a blossom of dark marks on your skin by morning, you  _ want _ to be marked. You  _ want _ Eren to have this. The knowledge that he is finally giving into some dark, hidden part of himself feels almost freeing as much as it does arousing in equal amounts.

But even though the man seems broken against the heat of his instincts, he still hesitates; soft lips hover just above your skin. His gaze feels so heavy.

“I’ve wanted t’do this to you,” he murmurs. The motion of his hips emphasize each word, making the bed practically shake and squeak to the rhythm of his voice. “You always looked so cute in my hand. When you came on my tongue. Taste so  _ sweet _ . So small.” He growls, thrusting hard enough that a whine leaves you in how his cock slides against your inner walls. “Wanted t’cover you in marks,  _ my _ marks. Want everyone in the walls to know you’re  _ mine _ .”

It’s almost a mantra, his words, and the motion of his body is akin to possessive worship. Eren moves with desperate purpose that leaves you quivering beneath him. It’s hard to even  _ think _ , let alone find the words to try and reply to him in any meaningful way beyond the sound of his name as a broken sob muffled into the pillow. 

“Close-” you manage to say at last, aching for release or simply to feel the man spill his seed inside of you. “Eren-... Close…-!”

The man growls and bites down even harder over your neck, baring his teeth and picking up the already-rapid pace of his hips against yours. Some distant part of your mind is worried that the bedframe isn’t going to hold up to the rough, pounding motions, but it’s drowned by the white-hot blinding need to climax. To feel him inside you. To fill you up until you’re dripping with the evidence of your coupling dripping down the inside of your thighs. Pleasure is the only sensation that fills your mind and soul alike - you can’t find a single ounce of yourself to care about anything else.

Eren says something against your skin. You’re a little too lost in heat to realize what the words are, but he repeats it again with a low growl and a rough, bruising thrust that practically makes your entire body bounce forward on the bed.

“Say my name.”

The letters fall into your ear and come together to form words, and then finally the full command. It doesn’t take more than that for your mouth to fall open in submissive obedience, though he hardly needed to say anything for the sweet sound of Eren’s name to fall from your lips.

“Eh-reh-nuh-” the syllables feel as loose and messy as your body does, taking each slide of his cock inside of you like you were made for its shape. “Eh-...reh…”

He growls, and you can feel the way his tongue moves to form the word, “Louder.”

And just like that, the moment snaps. Crystal clarity surges through your mind and pleasure fills up every inch of your body when climax swiftly follows. It feels hot and wet and sweeping across your form, leaving you a trembling mess of moans and sobs.

“Eren!” You cry, body pressing back in time and tandem against his own. “Eren- Eren please! F-fill me up, fill me up I need you so muchrightnowpleaseEren-!”

Eventually your words blur together into a noise that can only be described as needing and carnal. They ache as much as your body does, every thrust of Eren’s cock echoing with the waves of unwinding euphoria until you’re certain nothing else exists but you and him alone. 

Eren trembles against you. The only warning you get of his impending climax is when he surges forward and forces the top of your body down into the bed with the tight grip of his teeth once more over the back of your neck. Thrusts become sloppy, losing their rhythm until the man is no more than desperately rutting himself against your body - until his twitching cock spills the heat of his release as deep inside of you as he can manage in such a mindless state.

There’s such a deep satisfaction in feeling the warmth fill your belly though you’re in the last moments of your own orgasm; there’s an instinctual sense of accomplishment in the act of having him fuck you so desperate and primal. A shiver of delight moves up your spine while you arch your back ever further, pressing your chest into the bed and your ass back against Eren’s hips as he shakes and shivers with pleasure.

After a few moments, you start to feel warm slickness rolling down the inside of your thighs. It feels messy but wonderful all the same, in the same way that exhaustion feels good after a long workout. You can’t even bring yourself to move in fear for shattering the moment. 

Eren moans lowly against your skin. His hips slow until they’re barely twitching against you, his cock milked dry and the entirety of his body as tired as you are. But even then, when you expect for him to pull out and fall into bed next to you, the man simply tugs you alongside him to turn and lay on your side with your back still pressed along the front of his body.

“Eren?” you murmur in muted confusion, just a breath away from trying to push yourself to sit up before the man nuzzles the back of your neck and wraps his arms tight around your waist - he keeps you from moving a single inch, legs tangled with yours in such a way that it’s impossible to do anything but lay beside him in the gentle afterglow.

“No. Stay like this,” he says softly, intentions as clear as crystal while you feel the gentle twitch of his half-hard cock inside of you. “I remember saying I’d fuck you until you’re round and full.”

A noise presses up against the back of your teeth. At first you think it’s going to be something of argument - if only because your body already feels so exhausted - but instead the noise that slips between your lips is little more than a weak, eager moan. Perhaps it’s the way Eren speaks with such confidence in the matter, or maybe even it’s how he holds you tight and safe against his chest. Nevertheless, there’s not an ounce of energy left in your mind or limbs to argue such a lovely promise, especially if Eren is keen on doing the work while pressing you into the mattress.

The man shifts so one of his hands can skim down the front of your body, until it rests palm-down against the curve of your lower belly. 

“Can you feel me? Right here?”

He presses his hand gently down against your lower stomach, until you can’t help but wiggle a little in either the real or imagined sensation of his cock nestled deeply inside your body. The movement forces more hot seed to drip from where the two of you are joined, and the realization that Eren seems to make good on his words finally filters past the post-orgasmic haze.

“Just wait until I’m done with you,” he murmurs excitedly, fingertips now lovingly rubbing soft circles over your belly. “You’ll be stuffed with my cum and so exhausted that I’ll keep you in bed all day with me to rest. Not a single soul will ever question who you belong to again.” 

The man finally nuzzles against the curve of a shoulder as his voice falls into a sweet, soothing coo. And as he does, there's a gentle curve to your lips as a memory comes to mind that both reminds and amuses you:

You'll have to let Levi know that his idea worked perfectly.

**Author's Note:**

> If you want to read more of my stuff, check out my Attack on Titan writing blog on Tumblr @ [attackontitanwritings](https://attackontitanwritings.tumblr.com/).


End file.
